Putting a custom logo on a Cisco 7940/7960 or 7905/7912

7940/7960

7940/7960

7905/7912

You can create a custom logo for both the 7940/7960 and 7905/7912 series phones fairly easy. - Although somewhat limited, but if you're creative enough, you can obtain fairly nice results.

Each series of phones has it's own requirements on the number of colors, image size, and the way the image is loaded in the phone. - Please use this chart to as a basic guideline:

Notes:

• Note 1 - If the image is too big, the phone will try to resize it (within reason).
• Note 2 - The actual bit-depth is 2. - If the image has more, the phone will 'degrade' the image to what it can display.
  I've seen greyscale files with as many as 240+ colors work.
  If you use our recommendation in the chart, you'll get excellent results.
• Note 3 -You'll convert the 'source' image file into a 'special' Cisco image file for the 7905/7912 before loading on the phone. - You also need to create a .BMP file as a source for these phones.

Creating your image file

You can use whatever software you like to create (or convert) your image file. - Save your image as a .BMP file for either series of phone.

We'll use the file name mylogo.bmp in our examples.

Getting your image into the phone

As we've said before, we only have experience with 'SIP'. - So here's what we do if you're phone's loaded with SIP:

7940/7960 - (The easiest) For these phones, all you need to do is:

• Transfer your image file to a web server (someplace).
  
  
• Add one line to either your 'SIPDefault.cnf' or your 'SIP[MAC ADRESS].cnf' file saying somthing like:
  
  logo_url: "http://www.mydomain.com/mylogo.bmp";
  
  
• After picking up this new parameter from the TFPD server, and the phone reboots, it'll download the imaged from the web server.

7905/7912 - (The 'not so easy process') This process requires several steps. - Luckilly Cisco provides us with software in each protocol's .zip package to do this with (using a Windoze box). - Again, we'll only be talking about 'SIP.

• The 7905/7912 likes to 'see' binary files coming from the tftp server. - So we need to jump through a few hoops to keep it happy.
  
  
• From your firmware's .zip file, copy the two programs: bmp2logo.exe, and cfgfmt.exe to the folder where your (image) .bmp file and your (possibly future) phone config file resides.
  
  
• Create the 'Cisco special binary' file of your image.
  
  
  • We'll use 'bmp2logo.exe' to do this. - The syntax for this command is:
    bmp2logo.exe [image number] [input file] [output file]. - For [image number], pick any integer except '1' (which is the default factory image already on the phone). - If your phone has a non-Cisco factory image, you may have to play with this image number until you find one that works.
    
    
  • From a DOS command prompt, go to the folder where 'bmp2logo.exe' and 'mylogo.bmp' resides and run a command that looks something like this:
    'bmp2logo.exe 5 mylogo.bmp logo'
    
    
  • You should see that you now have a file called 'logo' which is the 'Cisco binary image' file you want to put on your pnone.
    
    
  • Now move or copy your new 'logo' file to the root of your TFTPD server.
    
    
• Create the binary the phone will request when it boots up. - If you don't have an ASCII file for you phone's profile, create a new one named something like: 'config.txt'.
  
  
  • As with the image conversion, we also have to (1) create or modify a current configuration file then (2) convert it into a binary file the phone will accept.
    
    
  • If you don't already have a config file for the phone, create a new ascii file called something like 'config.txt' and add one line:
    
    upgradelogo:5,0,logo;
    
    Notes: - (1) Make sure you use the same image number you used when you ran 'bmp2logo.exe' - The '0' means that the image file is on the same tftpd server where the (binary) config file is located.
    
    
  • You can now close your 'config.txt' file.
    
    
  • When a 7905 boots... - (Sorry, I don't have a 7912 but am assuming it's very similar. - And, again, I'm only dealing with SIP..) - The phone also contacts the tfptd server and asks for two files:
    
    'lddefault.cnf'
    And a file named simply with the: [MAC ADDRESS] (in lower case).
    
    Since we're not worrying about any 'phone specific' stuff, we'll only deal with:
    'lddefault.cnf'. - That's the binary file we need to create for the phone to load.
    
    
  • To convert our ascii file to 'lddefault.cnf' we'll use the program from our .zip package called: 'cfgfmt.exe' - The syntax for this file is:
    
    'cfgfmt.exe <options> [input file] [output file]' - Don't worry about the 'options' as we won't be using any.
    
    
  • Let's now convert our configuration file to 'lddefault.cnf'.
    
    
  • Again from a DOS prompt, make sure you're in the directory where 'cfgfmt.exe' and 'config.txt' reside and run the following command:
    
    'cfgfmt.exe config.txt lddefault.cnf'
    
    
  • You should now have a new 'lddefault.cnf' file. - Move or copy this file to the root of your tftpd server.
    
    
• Reboot your phone. - If everything went okay, your phone will download your new 'lddefault.cnf' which will in turn tell the phone to download 'logo' and store the logo in it's flash memory. - Your phone should now show the new image on it's LCD screen.