NP-41 Emulator (may be)

[mwthomasjr]

(12-11-2017 06:01 PM)Chris Chung Wrote:  

(12-10-2017 10:33 PM)mwthomasjr Wrote:  I received my NP-41. Looks great! Powered up.

I am stuck in the Keyboard test. If I hit On then <- I get the battery voltage and it goes back to the keyboard test. What am I doing wrong?

I am afraid it might be DOA.

The key combo of ON + CLR should show MEMORY LOST.

I guess you had already tried
1) taking out and putting back your battery and retry.
2) make sure battery is relatively fresh.
3) try the ON-ON key sequence.

3) You should try to press all keys in the key test to make sure they are register different values to confirm the button solder points are good and working. If not, if you are able to, correct the problematic buttons.

4) The fact that you are seeing the version screen and can run the key test indicate this is not likely a hardware problem. It could happened that the firmware is corrupted and lead to a reset (say random machine code leads to some exception). I had it happen before that after trying to load a ROM via serial interface (which writes to the FRAM memory on the fly) and failed, the emulator got confused when trying to do an internal CAT during power-up, leading to failing to enter calculator mode.

In this case the thing we could try is to reload the firmware, except that it will require you to either have a TI programmer, or a USB-Serial setup.

If you tried the simple tricks and cannot get it resolved, please send it back and I will swap it w/ a replacement unit.

I guess I should have done a remove-and-insert battery check routine before shipping these units out. Instead I just did some calculations w/ the units and take their battery out for shipping.

Sorry for having disappointed you.

(12-12-2017 02:28 PM)Chris Chung Wrote:  +mwthomasjr
Please let me know that you had exhausted your options and I will send you a replacement unit right-away. You will need to send back the problematic unit to me.
If you had access to a USB-Serial cable and is confident to try the bootloader, it is also a good option.

The key test show a unique code for each key.

ON-CLR only continues the keycode test or goes to the voltage screen.

I have power cycled several times by removing and reinserting the battery.

I have tried 3 different new batteries.

ON-ON blanks the screen

I tried to connect the serial but could not get the bootloader. I didn't connect the + because the only serial I had was +5V on power. It is 3.3V on RX and TX. I eventually gave up on this.

My only disappointment is not being able to play right away, but a little patience will not hurt me.

Thanks,

Milton