Two cores broken?!

gabriele

Hi, i have bought an M5Stack from Amazon, after few days it stopped working. It played a white noise anytime i clicked the power/reset button but never turned on again. So i bought another one from Digikey, it worked just few minutes and... same problem! Just a little bit different... sometimes it works, sometimes it don't, if you're lucky it works, otherwise it just make this creepy sounds and doesn't start (90% of times i try to use it, it doesn't work). Are you serious?! Two different cores, from two different vendors and i got the same problem?! There is something i'm missing or this is the way this product should work?!

felmue

Hello @gabriele

sorry to hear about your trouble.

Which M5Stacks do you own - Basic Core, Gray or Fire?
Are you running from battery or USB? If battery, could you try with USB?
What are you running on your M5Stacks? UIFlow or your own firmware?

Felix

gabriele

@felmue both device are m5stack fire, i tried both usb and battery, the firmware is the original ui flow. With the second device i was not even able to flash any firmware, with the other one, i just flashed some led blinking test, always using ui flow. Then both devices died. Frankly speaking, if there is an hardware issue with the fire model it'd be better to say clearly. Two hardware faults (same problem!) on two devices is simply unacceptable!
Just to know, other m5stack models have different hardware or the hardware is the same than the fire model?

felmue

Hi @gabriele

I've just checked UIFlow (Desktop and online) with my Fire. Here are my steps:

Used Desktop UIFlow to burn latest Fire UIFlow firmware (1.6.2) onto M5Stack (included SSID & PW)
On M5Stack, went into Setup and switched mode to 'Internet Mode' and rebooted device (last menu entry)
Device reboots, connects to WiFi and shows API key
Opened online UIFlow (flow.m5stack.com) and entered API key
Connected to M5Stack
Put together some little program
Clicked on RUN (not download) and the little program gets executed
Note: this will only test RUN your program (but it will not download it)

Note: When you're happy with your program you can download it into your M5Stack using 'Download'. What's not really obvious though is that this will automatically switch the mode back to 'App Mode' before running the program. (That is the reason the connection is lost.)
You'll need to manually enter setup and switch the mode to 'Internet Mode' again if you want to reconnect and continue on your program from within UIFlow.

For reference: https://m5stack.github.io/UIFlow_doc/en/en/base/Run_Program.html

Hope this helps
Felix

world101

@felmue said in Two cores broken?!:

You'll need to manually enter setup and switch the mode to 'Internet Mode' again if you want to reconnect and continue on your program from within UIFlow.

Very nice and clear instructions 👍🏻

Regarding the manual setup, here is a hint. While the M5stack is booting with App mode set from before, hold down the button B (which shows two vertical dots “:” above it) and it should go directly into Internet mode, connect to WiFi, and then connect to the uiFlow cloud.

felmue

Hi @world101

thanks. And thanks for the hint with the B button. Works perfectly.

I am fairly new to UIFlow myself - only started to fiddle with it a couple of hours ago, but it's quite amazing what can be done.

(I normally program all my ESP32 / ESP8266 devices from within PlatformIO.)

Cheers
Felix

gabriele

@felmue sorry, i don't want to be rude, but did you read my post? The device doesn't even turn on, how it's supposed that i could use ui flow? When i click the power button i ear a noise and nothing happens. This problem occured with two different devices bought from different vendor, so i just would like to know: it's a known issue or it's jist me unlucky? There is a way to solve the problem? Since i am really disappointed with the fire model, the other models have the same hardware or maybe have a different design? Thank you

m5stack

in your PC does it identify the device COM? could you use M5Burner to Erase the flash . then upload the UIFlow Firmware again.

if still not work . check the print log by serial tool

m5stack

@felmue

this reference link was broken.

at now , all UIFlow block info is in this page

https://docs.m5stack.com/#/en/uiflow/uiflow_home_page

ajb2k3

@gabriele said in Two cores broken?!:

Hi, i have bought an M5Stack from Amazon, after few days it stopped working. It played a white noise anytime i clicked the power/reset button but never turned on again. So i bought another one from Digikey, it worked just few minutes and... same problem! Just a little bit different... sometimes it works, sometimes it don't, if you're lucky it works, otherwise it just make this creepy sounds and doesn't start (90% of times i try to use it, it doesn't work). Are you serious?! Two different cores, from two different vendors and i got the same problem?! There is something i'm missing or this is the way this product should work?!

1, Are you making sure to keep the batteries charged?
2, Have you properly installed the USB driver? (it can be temper-mental)
3, Have you installed M5Burner and flashed the new firmware?
4, Have the batteries swollen?

If you didn't buy them direct from M5Stack then there is a chance they they could have been sat long enough for the battery to have been badly depleted.

felmue

Hi @gabriele

yes, I did read your post, but I admit I missed the part where you wrote that your devices won't turn on at all. I thought you might have bad firmware loaded as you are still hearing a noise. Sorry about that.

Have you tried to connect the core w/o battery via USB to your computer? Does any of your Fire then start up? If yes, then probably the battery is dead, like @ajb2k3 pointed out.

As to your question about whether different M5Stacks are using different hardware. The M5Stack Gray and M5Stack Fire I own have almost identical hardware. The only difference is that M5Stack Fire has PSRAM, whereas the M5Stack Gray doesn't. I don't own a M5Stack Basic Core, but I am pretty sure it using the same hardware as well.

@m5stack - thank you for pointing that out. I appreciate it.

Thanks
Felix

gabriele

@m5stack after further investigation the problem seems to be the battery module, when i use the core with usb it works, but as soon as i put the battery it stops working. Can be a problem related to the IP5306? It's possible to have the schematic of the battery module of the fire core?

felmue

Hello @gabriele

glad to hear that at least your core is fine. I have my doubts that the IP5306 is at fault but one never knows. My guess would be the battery. Do you have a multimeter, if yes you could measure between pin labeled BATTERY and GND of the disconnected battery module to see if the battery outputs any voltage at all.

Battery module schematics can be found here - schematics is all the way down:
https://docs.m5stack.com/#/en/base/m5go_bottom

Good luck
Felix

liemph

I also have difficult times with M5Stack Fire particularly. The symptoms you mentioned also occurred in the past. The last resort I have done and it seems working is by opening the base which contains the battery. Unscrew the base, detach the base from the CPU. Connect your USB cable to your PC. The Fire will respond. Good luck.

m5stack

check the battery voltage.

HRG

Hi @gabriele and @m5stack,

just got my M5Stack Fire delivered this week as well (from a store in Switzerland) and facing similar problems:
When switching on, the screen stays black most of the time. (Now it already seems to stay black all the time)
When switching off, strange noise when the power button is pressed.
When booting, I see normal boot messages on UART over USB.
Charging the device also works.

I have erased/updated the firmware with M5Burner several times, but does not help.
I can even program it with UIFlow, e.g. RGB bar or speaker work nicely, but the display stays off.

Unmounting the M5Go Base (bottom with the battery) and powering the device over USB alone does not help!
Shorting the battery does not help neither.
The battery power is 4V, what is fine for a LiPo, so the battery seems OK.
When powered over USB only, there is no more noise during power button presses, but I cannot switch off, only restart the device then (may-be intended?).

It is really a pity, M5Stack builds such nice devices, environment, with lots of documentation (although still not perfect) and community. And then quality issues make it unusable!

gabriele

@m5stack the voltage of the battery is 4.1V, so it works properly. The situation is the same for @liemph the core only works without the base containing the battery, so i don't have the battery, the additional ports, the led bars and the microphone, so, why i bought the fire model? When i'll have time i'll investigate further but i'm really discouraged...

liemph

@gabriele That is the most regretful part of buying Fire. Now I am using the Fire with other bases such as Base-X for playing with my Lego motors. In this case, you definitely have to unplug the battery base.

gabriele

@liemph this is very sad... @m5stack how is it possible so many bases have this kind of problem? there is some way to fix it? Can we modify the board, soldering/desldering some component?

anyway @liemph, can you tell me where did you bought the base-x? It could be a good replacement, i've bought m5stack for my son and without the base is almost useless for him, thank you

liemph

I bought it from the official store in Aliexpress:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000481165186.html?spm=2114.12010612.8148356.1.eed67573HQiQdi
The base has also a battery included, so it will work without external power supply. But if you drive motors for a long time then you need to supply with external power. It has a DC connector for this purpose.