Puck stopped working

Posted on
  • I have had my puck for about a month now then today I discovered I couldn't connect then further discovered that it doesn't reboot or hard reset. No LED's come on. I replaced the battery but still nothing. What are my options to find out what is wrong?

  • Sun 2019.04.28

    Hello @user99665, to effectively diagnose, will need a bit more information please.

    'I replaced the battery but still nothing'

    Are we absolutely sure this is a brand new battery? e.g. try another one
    Is the battery upside down? e.g. making proper contact

    What event occurred immediately before discovering no LED's? e.g. dropped
    Were there any mods to the Puck? e.g. soldering
    What code was running? e.g. was NRF.sleep() used

    Would you please post the code that was running, along with the results of process.env so that it may be determined if there might have been an endless loop causing the battery to drain.

    Was save() used a month ago to store your code then? It could be you aren't seeing LED's as you are accustomed to, as memory (your code) would have been wiped out had the battery gone dead.



    Reference in case it hasn't been discovered yet, for future development:

    Tutorials forum

    'Quick Start Best Practices - Puck tips - increasing battery life - change xmit distance - advertising interval'

    http://forum.espruino.com/conversations/­324125/

  • I soldered headers quite soon after getting my puck (See image)
    I had uploaded a simple "placemark" program that didn't use the LED's
    I did use save() about a a week ago, I removed it
    The battery isn't brand new, I will get one next I am out
    I didnt drop it
    Didn't use NRF.sleep()
    I used a chromebook to interface with the puck, will scratch around to see if I can find any logs (process.env)


    1 Attachment

    • forreply.jpg
  • Until a brand new battery test can be performed, would it be correct to go under the assumption that code was continuously running for that month and just drained the battery, as it doesn't appear that any other outside event caused an issue?

    BLE continuous advertising for example



    Several links within this forum post of duration calculations (follow embedded links)

    http://forum.espruino.com/comments/14659­868/

  • Did you already do a Hard Reset? - see http://www.espruino.com/Puck.js#i-saved-­some-code-and-my-puck-js-no-longer-works­, section Hard Reset.

    ...and - yeah - it helps having the battery's voltage measured by itself or when inserted - latter via pins of your headers.

    (Notice the puck sitting on surface without case... depending what that surface is can have an impact... since you solder and do similar things, you are aware of possible issues, I assume).

  • I put a brand new battery in and its back in business. Thank you @Robin. I will definitely go and look at what drained the battery and read the links you all so kindly shared with me

  • Sorry you're having issues - as other said though, I'd check the battery. It's on unheard of that the occasional CR2032 battery actually comes out the box completely flat.

    If you have a volt meter it'd be an easy way to test.

    Also try inserting the battery with the button held down and see if anything lights up - the JS code on the Puck itself can't overwrite the bootloader (except with a lot of effort) so realistically regardless of what happened you should be able to get the green LED of the bootloader lit up.

  • Ahh - missed this by a few minutes. Glad you're sorted!

    I should release a new firmware soon, and I believe that (or cutting edge builds) will also have some big battery life improvements

  • That is great news, thanks

  • Post a reply
    • Bold
    • Italics
    • Link
    • Image
    • List
    • Quote
    • code
    • Preview
About

Puck stopped working

Posted by Avatar for user99665 @user99665

Actions