Can't get tinker or any other firmware working

Troubleshooting
1

I’ve come back to my Photon that hasn’t seen the light of day for a couple years. I’ve read and followed every tutorial and forum post I can, but can’t get the device to a good state.

The device after boot always breathes magenta (blue/red).
I’ve registered it and it shows up in the Particle app. but always shows offline. Trying to reflash Tinker from the app fails. (I cannot use the app to do anything because the device is always offline, but the app “last sees” it anytime it gets rebooted.)
I’ve connected it to my PC via USB and have successfully registered it with my account/cloud and my home wifi.

I’ve successfully (it tells me success) flash https://github.com/particle-iot/firmware/releases/tag/v0.7.0 using the Particle CLI.
Trying to do a particle update or using the webIDE to build the basic Blink example and flash that always results in the following message:

Error writing firmware: Invalid DFU suffix signature
A valid DFU suffix will be required in a future dfu-util release!!!
Error during download get_status

I’ve also followed these instructions of attempting to particle update it over and over till it works with no luck (tried 7-8 times in a row)

Am I missing something? Is there one more troubleshooting step I can try which I’ve missed?

thanks!

2

Can you place it in Listening mode, do a particle serial inspect and particle serial identify then share the info here?

3

thanks for the response. Here is what I get:

C:\photon>particle serial inspect
Platform: 6 - Photon
Modules
Bootloader module #0 - version 2, main location, 16384 bytes max size
Integrity: FAIL
Address Range: PASS
Platform: PASS
Dependencies: PASS
System module #1 - version 207, main location, 262144 bytes max size
Integrity: PASS
Address Range: PASS
Platform: PASS
Dependencies: PASS
System module #2 - version 207, main location, 262144 bytes max size
Integrity: PASS
Address Range: PASS
Platform: PASS
Dependencies: FAIL
System module #1 - version 207
Bootloader module #0 - version 7
User module #1 - version 5, main location, 131072 bytes max size
UUID: DB88160717098B7A06661AD00F6011F1F08745A352FA0D2B9F034ECFFA4533E0
Integrity: PASS
Address Range: PASS
Platform: PASS
Dependencies: PASS
System module #2 - version 207
User module #1 - version 2, factory location, 131072 bytes max size
UUID: 696300616C6C0000000000000000000000000B090A080D090A0819010A086D03
Integrity: PASS
Address Range: PASS
Platform: PASS
Dependencies: PASS
System module #2 - version 1

C:\photon>particle serial identify

Your device id is 1e003b000547343339373536
Your system firmware version is 0.7.0

4

I looks like your Photon has some failed modules.

Can you download bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin from https://github.com/particle-iot/firmware/releases/tag/v0.7.0 and:

  1. place the Photon in DFU mode
  2. do a `particle flash --usb bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin
  3. place the Photon in DFU mode and do a particle serial inspect and you should see that all PASS now
5

@kennethlimcp the bootloader can only be flashed via Listening Mode and particle flash --serial bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin

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6

That’s new to me. I do that with bootloader binaries all the time.

Maybe I should test it again.

1 Like
7

The reason is that DFU Mode is executed by the bootloader, hence you cannot replace the bootloader while it’s active.

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8

Thanks for the help - unfortunately I'm getting roughly the same error.

When I put it into Blue-listen mode, I get this error when trying to use the photon-bootloader

C:\photon>particle flash --usb bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin

!!! I was unable to detect any devices in DFU mode...

Your device will blink yellow when in DFU mode.
If your device is not blinking yellow, please:

  1. Press and hold both the RESET/RST and MODE/SETUP buttons simultaneously.

  2. Release only the RESET/RST button while continuing to hold the MODE/SETUP button.

  3. Release the MODE/SETUP button once the device begins to blink yellow.

Error writing firmware: No DFU device found

So I put it into yellow-DFU mode and try again:

C:\photon>particle flash --usb bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin

!!! I was unable to detect any devices in DFU mode...

So, lets try force....

C:\photon>particle flash --usb bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin --force
Error writing firmware: Invalid DFU suffix signature
A valid DFU suffix will be required in a future dfu-util release!!!
Error during download get_status

Anything else I can try?

9

Can you place it in listening mode and do a particle serial identify to see if the cable is working fine?

If yes, please follow the steps by @ScruffR :

particle flash --serial bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin

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10

YES!!! identify found it…so trying particle flash --serial bootloader-0.7.0-photon.bin in blue mode said successful.
And after a few seconds its breathing cyan and the app says its online!

Thanks so much for the help!

(edit - I see I missed the “serial” part of the command when trying your suggestion earlier for bootloader)

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