Spark Core breathing white

Troubleshooting
1

I finally got around to messing with my kickstarter’d core, and was having some fun playing with a Neopixel ring last night.

At one point I stopped being able to flash my core, and tried to reset wifi, reset to factory defaults, etc.

Nothing seemed to work, so I installed spark-cli and followed the instructions to flash the cc3000 / tinker / deep update.

I can put the core into bootloader (flashing yellow mode), and flash, but after I reset it, it just breathes white and I can’t put it into listening mode no matter how many factory resets I do.

I’ve read the few other breathing white threads I could find here on the forums, but no love. Can anyone help me out?

2

Sorry you are having trouble. What exactly commands and responses are you getting when you attempt to flash tinker onto the Core. The command should be spark flash --usb tinker

3

I followed the instructions here: https://github.com/spark/spark-cli#apply-the-cc3000-patch

The only difference was in between each step, my core does not appear to reboot, and I have to reboot it and manually put it back into bootloader step.

When I apply power to the core (via USB), or hit rst, it immediately starts slow breathing white. Holding down mode does not cause it to go into listening mode.

Here’s the output of flashing the tinker firmware:

❯ spark flash --usb tinker
FOUND DFU DEVICE 1d50:607f
checking file  /usr/local/lib/node_modules/spark-cli/binaries/spark_tinker.bin
spawning dfu-util -d 1d50:607f -a 0 -i 0 -s 0x08005000:leave -D /usr/local/lib/node_modules/spark-cli/binaries/spark_tinker.bin
dfu-util 0.8

Copyright 2005-2009 Weston Schmidt, Harald Welte and OpenMoko Inc.
Copyright 2010-2014 Tormod Volden and Stefan Schmidt
This program is Free Software and has ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY
Please report bugs to dfu-util@lists.gnumonks.org

dfu-util: Invalid DFU suffix signature
dfu-util: A valid DFU suffix will be required in a future dfu-util release!!!
Opening DFU capable USB device...
ID 1d50:607f
Run-time device DFU version 011a
Claiming USB DFU Interface...
Setting Alternate Setting #0 ...
Determining device status: state = dfuERROR, status = 10
dfuERROR, clearing status
Determining device status: state = dfuIDLE, status = 0
dfuIDLE, continuing
DFU mode device DFU version 011a
Device returned transfer size 1024
DfuSe interface name: "Internal Flash  "
Downloading to address = 0x08005000, size = 79996
Download	[=========================] 100%        79996 bytes
Download done.
File downloaded successfully
Transitioning to dfuMANIFEST state
Flashed!
4

What happens after this, do you need to reboot it or does it reboot on it’s own (back to white?)

5

After the tinker flash, it briefly goes white then goes right back to breathing white.

6

@mute,

usually a breathing white status means that the CC3000 is not responding…

I guess the core was working fine before? Let’s it power up and sit for some time and see if it eventually enters blinking green

7

Core was working fine before, then it just stopped letting me flash from the website no matter what I tried.

I just let it sit plugged in for 8 hours and it never stopped breathing white. :frowning:

8

Sounds like the CC3000 is not working…

9

Hey @mute, send an email hello@spark.io and we’ll get you sorted out. Reference this thread please!

10

Did Spark.io ever get back to you about this? what was the solution? I’ve encountered the same issue.

-Brent

11

The spark team took care of me, I’d suggest contacting them and see if they can help.

12

Hello!

I have the same issue (white breathing and unable to bring it to listening mode) and tried already also the firmware update over DFU.
Is there also a public solution or do I have to write to somewhere extra?
Core is from the beginning of year 2014

13

@andres_particle,

hope this helps: [Spark core] Common issues

14

Looks like my Core has the same issue: it was working fine but then started with white breathing and unable to bring it to listening mode. Tried several times to factory-reset but still no way to get it into listening mode. Does anyone have a suggestion or a solution?

15

Did you try the suggestions given in the post linked directly prior your own post?

16

Of course.

17

And what was the output of all these particle CLI calls?

18

Well, it does not even appear on USB (message with Core in DFU mode: “No devices available via serial”. I tried also a serial monitor to see if it reacts, but nothing. I also tried the Particle Firmware Manager, which also does not detect any device on USB.

19

If you were using the commands as shown in the post you wouldn't get that message as DFU Mode (and in that way particle flash --usb ...) does not expect to find a device via serial.

Have you got DFU drivers installed correctly?

What OS are you on?

20

I am on Mac OS and I think the drivers are OK. I have no problems interacting with my Photons and Electrons (unless they use a different way of communicating than the Core.

Anyway, I tried particle flash --usb tinker and I get this response in the terminal:

running dfu-util -l
Found DFU device 1d50:607f
checking file /usr/local/lib/node_modules/particle-cli/binaries/core_tinker.bin
spawning dfu-util -d 1d50:607f -a 0 -i 0 -s 0x08005000:leave -D /usr/local/lib/node_modules/particle-cli/binaries/core_tinker.bin
dfu-util 0.9

Copyright 2005-2009 Weston Schmidt, Harald Welte and OpenMoko Inc.
Copyright 2010-2016 Tormod Volden and Stefan Schmidt
This program is Free Software and has ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY
Please report bugs to http://sourceforge.net/p/dfu-util/tickets/

dfu-util: Invalid DFU suffix signature
dfu-util: A valid DFU suffix will be required in a future dfu-util release!!!
Deducing device DFU version from functional descriptor length
Opening DFU capable USB device…
ID 1d50:607f
Run-time device DFU version 011a
Claiming USB DFU Interface…
Setting Alternate Setting #0 …
Determining device status: state = dfuERROR, status = 10
dfuERROR, clearing status
Determining device status: state = dfuIDLE, status = 0
dfuIDLE, continuing
DFU mode device DFU version 011a
Device returned transfer size 1024
DfuSe interface name: "Internal Flash "
Downloading to address = 0x08005000, size = 79996
Download [=========================] 100% 79996 bytes
Download done.
File downloaded successfully
Transitioning to dfuMANIFEST state

Flash success!

After that, I get exactly the same behaviour as described above by mute (15 Februare posts and thereafter). This means - the Core is back breathing white after the flashing.

  • after pressing the reset button it is immediately breathing white again
  • holding the Mode button does not bring it into listening mode.