EOS M questions: Photo on entire screen in playback mode, get external flash to fire, firmware

[p27159]

Q1:  how can I get my photo to take the whole screen after I take the picture and when I am in playback mode, instead of having all of these items that I really don’t want? See attached image.  It’s hard for me to evaluate my picture when it’s so small.

Q2: How to get external flash to fire?  Instructions online appear to indicate I need to be in manual mode.  The EOS M only has the three settings shown in the second image.  I select the white camera image in the middle.  I then tap the SET Button in the middle of the wheel and see the option for the flash as shown in the third image.  But I can never get the flash to fire even though I hear it turn on and the orange light on my external flash is lit, indicating it’s ready to fire.

Q3: how do I update my firmware? I downloaded a newer Version onto my PC.  I see two sets of instructions, one to install the SD card from my camera into the computer, which doesn’t work because my computer says it’s write protected. The other says, I can load a utility on my PC and then connect the camera to the PC except I can’t find the utility program, and the only two ports on the side of my camera appear to be HDMI and digital outputs, neither one appears to allow me to INPUT A new firmware file from my PC to the camera

 

 

[Waddizzle]

You can download apps, firmware, and the full User Guide from the following link

https://www.usa.canon.com/support/p/eos-m 

SD memory cards have a write-protect switch.  Your switch might be enabled.  Be sure to only use full size cards. 

[rs-eos]

Pressing the "INFO" button will cycle amongst various displays on the LCD screen.

[p27159]

I already went to that link.  I see where to get the updated FIRMWARE.  As I said in my post, I was able to do that part.  But I cannot find any kind of app that has menus that would allow a control of a process to load the firmware file from my PC to my camera, and as I said, I can't figure out how to connect the camera to the PC hardware-wise anyway, so I was hoping for more help on this.

[p27159]

Thanks for the tip about the INFO button, that worked!  At least one of my three issues is solved now!

[p27159]

I forgot to add that I knew I couldn't be in write protect mode since I was able to save photos to the card, and I ejected the card and confirmed the switch was not set to write protect mode, so something else is preventing me from using it. I may have to try a brand new card and insert it into my PC, copy the firmware file onto it and then put the SD card into my camera to see if that works.

[p27159]

I just tried what I said in my previous comment, I found another blank SD card I didn't realize I had, copied the firmware onto it from the PC, and am in the process of loading it onto the camera.  The firmware update instructions left quite a bit to be desired, and also has several non-essential steps in it. You don't have to put the camera in any mode in particular, just pressing the MENU button and scrolling to reach the right tools menu that has the firmware version on it, and selecting it and following the prompts from there was what I needed to do.  This should have been explained much better in the manual. Since part of my job involves writing instruction manuals and procedures, I am pretty sensitive to poorly written manuals.