well I finally got my nokia n900. and it's used so I want to completely wipe it. I've read the guide on the maemo wiki but I don't understand what I need to do first. the emmc or the fiasco?

Flash fiasco first.

"When flashing the eMMC content, always flash the eMMC/VANILLA image first, and then flash the FIASCO/Rootfs image. Do not boot up the device between the two i.e do NOT use the -R parameter at the end! Rationale: on accidental booting in between the 2 flash processes, the sequence formerly suggested (rootfs first) will result in a broken system. The sequence "eMMC first, then rootfs" is checked back with Nokia affiliates and is proven to work. The former advice on tablets-dev.nokia.com was not based on any facts for the recent eMMC VANILLA image. It's fixed now and in line with this wiki"

so that has nothing to do with it? I mean whats the worst that can happen if I do it the wrong way round.it says broken system but does that mean it can be fixed with a reflash?

also how big is the EMMC image? because the image that keeps downloading is only 48mb

Ok, sorry, remembered wrong apparently. Just do what the wiki says and it should go just fine. The eMMC image isn't big because (as far as I know) it only contains the default MyDocs folders and files.

190mb is kernel
249mb is emmc. might be bigger for me because it's 8gb root and 21 MyDocs

so run these command

cd "%ProgramFiles%\maemo\flasher-3.5" (this is to load up flasher)

flasher-3.5.exe -F RX-51_2009SE_2.2009.51-1_PR_COMBINED_MR0_ARM.bin -f (this is Kernel image)

flasher-3.5.exe -F RX-51_2009SE_10.2010.13-2.VANILLA_PR_EMMC_MR0_ARM.bin -f (this is EMMC image)

make sure bold bits match your downloaded file


edit: this is what would happen if you flash it the wrong way around
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=67691

am using this for the firmware is this okay

RX-51_2009SE_20.2010.36-2_PR_COMBINED_MR0_ARM.bin

tele, I think this has since changed a few days ago on the updating the firmware wiki which was updated on 21/12/2010. Now it states to flash the eMMC before the fiasco image. I've also looked on the nokia "tablets-dev.nokia.com" firmware download page and it has also been updated with the same advice.

The reasoning behind the amended advice (from what I read on the wiki) is because it's possible to get a broken system if you accidentally reboot between flashing rootfs first followed by eMMC.

This is from the wiki history explaining the amendment:
Rationale: on accidental booting in between the 2 flash processes, the sequence formerly suggested (rootfs first) will result in a broken system. The sequence "eMMC first, then rootfs" is checked back with Nokia affiliates and is proven to work. The former advice on tablets-dev.nokia.com was not based on any facts for the recent eMMC VANILLA image. It's fixed now and in line with this wiki --joerg rw

strange i always flashed kernel first and then emmc no problems yet :s

so it means that no matter what u flash first its the samething but be careful dont restart ur N900 during flashing...

Riiight... the kernel's part of that image, that image is called a FIASCO image and contains the bootloader, rootfs, 2nd loader, modem firmware, AND kernel.
Second one is eMMC/Vanilla, and it's for the 32GB eMMC, contains MyDocs, swap (768MBs) and 2GB /home (and /opt).

Please check what you're saying before you do that.

Also, @ op, flash anything you want first, just don't use -R after flashing any of the images so the device doesn't reboot after flashing the image.