Titanium Card
This down here is the Titanium card. There are several versions around, all based on different components. This blue one with the hologram, is based on the Atmel 90S3232C chip and it is produced by Sagem. The EEprom memory size on these Titanium cards is 32Kbit. This is the card that was first introduced by Satarmy and are therefor generally called the 'original' Titanium cards.
There are allso other Titanium cards around which are based on Atmels 90S3232C, 90S3232CS or 90S6464C processors. Most of the time, these cards can be distinguished by the print on the card. Sometimes the cards are plain white, sometimes they look identical to the original one, but they either lack the hologram, or use another hologram. These cards are known by many different names (white, clone, imitation etc.) but I will call them clones here.
As you maybe know, there was a lot of fuss in early 2004, when it turned out that there were files that could actually destroy your card. It soon turned out that only clones were destroyed by these files. Originals were not affected. Investigation by several people showed that those malicious files contained a code that was specifically designed to distinguish the original (Satarmy version) cards from the clones. When a clone configuration was detected, it was destroyed, while originals were not affected.
Fortunately, nowadays there is software that will allow you to test the files before you program them. That way you can prevent most problems. What these programs do is check if the file contains a routine that will try to write to the OTP EEprom (One Time Programming EEprom). Files that try to write to that OTP area, may well be trying to destroy your card, because writing to this area should not be required for normal operation of the files. So any file containing such a routine should be considered a risk and not be programmed to your card.
There is only very little software available to program this card and it seems that many people have trouble programming their card. Unfortunately there are many many things that can cause your programming to fail. First of all, the Titanium Cardprog software, which is the most used software, is very critical in its timing. That is the main reason why this software will not work with any virtual or emulated COM ports (like with USB programmers).
Having said that, it may be clear that correct COM port settings are crucial for successfull programming. So in order to help you check if at least your COM port settings are correct, I have created some screenshots of my system which works perfect. Just compare these settings with the actual settings on your own PC and adjust them if necessary.
Now this one down here might be a potential problem cause. I have received several emails from people in which they tell me that they need to un-tick the Fifo buffers tick box. So if your programming efforts keep failing, try play with this option.
