I purchased a Sky Viper V2450GPS as a gift online and it seems to be bricked. I am decent at tech stuff so I figured I would be able to get it working but I am completely stumped.
My problem seems very similar to the one posted here:
The controller (TX) can connect to the drone and I can connect via WIFI, but when I go to 192.168.99.1, none of the parameters are exposed or responsive, except for the live video stream. I can also Take Pictures and Toggle Recording from the web interface and it stores them correctly on the installed SD Card.
However, my Flight Firmware is shown as āunknown unknownā and my Transmitter firmware is shown as āunknownā
I tried placing the latest firmware and renaming it as flight_fw.abin and that did not work.
I tried uploading the firmware through the web interface and that did not work.
I tried placing āFACRESET.TXTā in the root of the SD Card and that did not work.
Iām thinking the previous owner may have screwed up the Baud Rate settings trying to connect it to GPS software, but this is where my skills start to dissipate.
I tried to PuTTY into the 2017 port and I didnāt know what the commands would be to reset the Baud Rate. I did however, try to update the firmware from the web interface and I got the following, never ending loop of errors output to the PuTTy terminal:
dev> file_upload: uploadtype=ArduPilot filename=flight_fw.abin size=1148439
ardupilot_upgrade: size=1148439
checking firmware MD5
MD5: 01cb6568d509d939f016f69ab143f5f7
Good MD5 on fc fw image
Good MD5 on image - starting upgrade
Attempting to get telemetry control
serial switching drained 0 bytes
Sending mavlink reboot
Setting local baud to 115200
Sending mavlink reboot
Setting local baud to 625000
Setting local baud to 416000
Setting local baud to 312000
Setting local baud to 250000
Setting local baud to 208000
Set ting local baud to 115200
Getting bootloader sync
Failed to recv sync
Still awaiting sync (0/10) (0 bytes drained)
Failed to recv sync
Still awaitingsync (1/10) (0 bytes drained)
Failed to recv sync
Still awaiting sync (2/10) (0 bytes drained)
Failed to recv sync
Still awaiting sync (3/10) (0 bytes drained)
Failed to recv sync
Still awaiting sync (4/10) (0 bytes drained)
After 4/10 it would just continue a āFailed to recv syncā message over and over and over.
Can anyone please help point me in the right direction here? I actually bought this as a gift for a friend and his birthday is July 10th, I am running out of time trying to get this to work!
I think this is a classic case of the Sonix board cable being disconnected from the Flight board.
I suggest checking that out.
The Sonix is the WiFi board so it makes sense since the WebApp canāt seem to communicate to the Flight board. I bet if you went to the āMessagesā tab on APWeb syste status page itād have some messages like that.
Oops, didnāt read @peterbarkerās entire post, he already said thatā¦still that sounds more logical. And I provided pictures
Easy to disassemble. Take off the battery holder with screws. A few more screws and the bottom casing comes off. You shouldnāt have to mess with anything else, as the Sonix will be right there. Just make sure the cable is snug and plug the battery back inā¦see if it starts working. If the Tx is connecting AND your Wifi is connecting, then it is safe to assume both boards are working correctlyā¦they just arenāt working together.
Thanks for the detailed response! Iāll definitely check this out. I recall the few times I checked the messages log the was actually nothing there, no messages at all (in the web application).
Unfortunately, Iām away for the weekend so I wonāt be able to tackle this right away, but Iāll get to it as soon as I can and let you know how it goes.
My experience (since you referenced my similar issue) was that the telnet session would eventually resolve that long running script that seems endless, and allow for console input (like poke-testing to find the baud rate). Once you diagnose your physical board connections, try telnet again, or maybe the baud is fine and it was just the board being disconnected and youāre hopefully good to go. Fingers crossed for you, dude.
The issue I had with the PuTTy telnet session is that I had no idea what the commands were. I couldnāt figure out how to check or set the baud rate, see what serial channel was set, etc. It was just a black screen. I did some investigating for the correct info but couldnāt find much, and it was getting late.
How did you eventually actually set the baud to 57600 using Telnet?
You will be able to type āhelpā to list all commands available to you. You will want to type ābaudrateā then the integer value you want to set (57600, or maybe something elseā¦that value was proprietary to my circumstance because of my own snafu, but I had set it for a reason). Assuming that there wasnāt just a physical connection problem and the baud rate is maybe fine.
Thatās interesting, I actually figured you literally meant āhelpā in your post, but it didnāt work for me.
For what itās worth Iām using PuTTy as my telnet session client. When I connect and type āhelpā it just says unknown command. Same with many other things I tried (baudrate, serial1_baudrate, etc.). Could it be the fact Iām using PuTTy and not the suggested client? (Suggested client was blocked by my antivirus and I assumed it shouldnāt matter).
Either way Iāll try to get the drone before I leave and check it out in my downtime before Sunday.
I used PuTTy and it worked fine. The issue with PuTTy is it doesnāt handle the line breaks like netcat does so the text is all over the place, but the commands still work.
Ensure youāre connected to the SVās Access point, the telnet to 192.168.99.1 on port 2017 using TCPā¦it should just work.
netcat is typically flagged by antivirus because hackers like to embed it in other things (like JPGs or word documents) and use it to initiate a reverse shell. so AV automatically flag it.
Again, I still think your issues are disconnected cable.
good luck!
Huh, thatās weird. You should literally be able to type āhelpā to list out
all commands (I tested it myself before posting that, just to verify that
it was āhelpā and not ā?ā or something elseā¦itās definitely āhelpā).
For telnet, I am using JuiceSSH from my Android phone. PuTTY should work
fine, tho; Iāve used it in the past for other purposes without issue, but
not for anything drone related (simply out of circumstance: I use my phone
for droning, and Iād already downloaded the JuiceSSH app when I was putting
together a network diagnostic tools folder for general WiFi
troubleshooting).
I took the done apart today and the connections seem fine? In fact, when I remove the connection from the sonix board, the wifi access point SSID isnāt even broadcast, likely because at that point there is no power to the sonix board which has the wifi.
I plugged the cable back in and powered it back up and everything is back to my original problem. I see the are four connectors, could a single wire cause this?
I did notice that the metal case of the sonix board is really hot when the battery is connected, is that normal?
I did download juice ssh and was able to properly connect to the telnet session and get all the commands and whatnot from my phone (donāt have computer), but I donāt really know how to troubleshoot through that session. When I checked mavlink status it did say zero sent and received at 625000.
Yes the Sonix board does get hot when it has power. Yes a single wire can cause this. I had it not getting a reading from the magnetometer. Someone told me to reconnect the GPS board. I looked at the connector and two of the female pins had slide backwards just enough to break contact. Once I fixed the bent lock tabs and reassembled it started working fine.
I really canāt see anything to suggest the connection is bad.
I mentioned in the original post that the LED lights turn on when I plug in the battery, but they only stay on for a moment (one second?) and then they fade out, as if a capacitor is discharging. Also, my TX connects (I think? It makes a sing-song noise) but the GPS Mode Green LED flashes continuously, and none of the buttons seem to do anything.
Also, just to be sure, the connection in question is the one I have highlighted, correct?
I tested every wire of the cable in the above photo, from board to board with a DMM for continuity and all looked good. I had continuity and no shorts between the wires.
To me this makes it seem like it isnāt a problem with that connection. Unless thereās something I am missing.
Any other ideas? I am really stumped and July 10th is fast approaching. I was really hoping I could use this but Iām starting to worry that I cannot
It always gets stuck on āgetting bootloader syncā and canāt seem to sync with the bootloader.
Can you describe the behaviour of the LEDs on the flight board when
powering up? When the bootloader is active there should be a rapidly
flashing orange light.
Does the stm32 get very hot very quickly when powered on?
When I first power up, the LED on the flight board flickers orange for about 5 seconds, and the red/green LEDs turn on for about 1 second then fade off in about 1 second (2 seconds total).
Yes, the stm32 gets hot relatively fast. The video and wifi do both work from the webpage though.
Do you think itās worth finding a spare STM32 board online?
When I first power up, the LED on the flight board flickers orange for about 5 seconds, and the red/green LEDs turn on for about 1 second then fade off in
about 1 second (2 seconds total).
Yes, the stm32 gets hot relatively fast. The video and wifi do both work from the webpage though.
Sorry, when I mean hot I mean ātoo hot to touchā.
Do you think itĀ¢s worth finding a spare STM32 board online?
The fact it seems to be running the bootloader tells me that the stm32
should actually be OK. However, the bootloader isnāt ever detected by the
Sonix board. Whatever is on the board is good enough for the bootloader
to try to runā¦ but whatever is on there doesnāt know how to run the
LEDs and doesnāt talk over the serial port.
You could gather another data point (and possibly rescue the board) by
connecting the stm32 board to a usb-to-serial adaptor and trying to
talk to it / flash it with APBootloaderClient.
@peterbarker Sounds difficult, but Iām willing to try.
[EDIT] Sorry, I made a mistake earlier, itās the SONIX board that gets very hot, not the STM 32 board. The STM32 board doesnāt really get warm at all.
I also went online and bought another sonix board. Maybe that was frivolous but I really want to get this up and running soon!
Either way, is there an instruction link to the flashing process you mentioned? I find the wiki a little difficult to browse.
