I can't connect to the Photon anymore

Troubleshooting
1

Hi, new user here. I’ can’t connect to the Photon after briefly being able to use it. I’m wondering if anyone can help. Here’s what happened:

I powered on my Photon for the first time last night, set up the Wi-Fi with the Android app, and I successfully flashed and tested the “Blink an LED” and “Web-connected LED” apps using the “Particle Build” website. I then flashed “DS18X20_Temperature” and successfully monitored the serial output via USB.

Here’s where I started having problems:

Next, I tried to modify that app for web connectivity (to read the temperature from a web browser), and the software compiled and possibly flashed to the device, but after a few iterations of verify/flash/test I could no longer flash the device. I disconnected all electrical connections (except power) and tried to flash just the “Blink an LED” app. No luck.

I tried unplugging from power, resetting, and after a few rounds of that, I tried to re-set the Wi-Fi authentication using the Android app. I tried several times and got the message “Uh oh! Setup process couldn’t disconnect from the Photon Wi-Fi network. This is an internal problem with the device…” Note before this message I successfully completed the steps 1) Choose your Photon 2) Connecting to Photon 3) Select your Wi-Fi network 4) Configuring Device Wi-Fi credentials (check) 5) Connecting to Wi-Fi Network (check) . After this point I would see the error message above (“Uh-oh!..”)

At this point I searched the forums and documentation and observed that my Photon was slow-blinking white, so it needed a factory reset and/or a firmware update. I’m pretty sure it came with 0.4.9, but I followed the procedure to flash to 0.4.9 anyway. This was successful (I think), I used the dfu-util program to download both firmware files. I also tried to do the factory reset but never saw the blinking yellow lights.

TL;DR New Photon previously tested working, now slow blinking white. Wi-Fi configuration through the Android app connection fails before finishing. I am on 0.4.9. Factory Reset doesn’t work.

Thanks in advance for your help.

2

What Factory Reset? (there is none as such on the Photon - but something like particle update with subsequent particle flash --usb tinker would act like the Core’s FR).
Have you tried Safe Mode?
This should be the first thing to try before doing all the other things you described :wink:

3

Safe mode worked. Thank you!

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