Might have bricked my Omega2+, can't connect via serial

cusackph

Hello,
I tried to do a sysupgrade to my omega2+ running on a mini dock to the latest firmware. The amber light was flashing for a while, at least 5 minutes, and when I came back several minutes later to check on it the light was off. Having seen this before I unplugged and replugged it in since the light wasn't on or blinking. Now, the amber light turns on for about 5 seconds, then turns off. OSX and PuTTY seem to be able to see the device but when I try to connect, I get a blank terminal screen. What do I do from here? I've also got an arduino 2 dock.
edit: If I hold down the reset button on the mini dock and plug it in, then hit the command in OSX, here is the last bit of output I can get (when it first boots I can see where it says hold reset for more options but holding the reset button on my mini dock does nothing, it just flies past):

[    0.501954] rt3050-esw 10110000.esw: link changed 0x00
[    0.509703] mtk_soc_eth 10100000.ethernet eth0: mediatek frame engine at 0xb0100000, irq 5
[    0.518301] i2c /dev entries driver
[    0.522501] mt7621_wdt 10000120.watchdog: Initialized
[    0.529236] NET: Registered protocol family 10
[    0.537733] NET: Registered protocol family 17
[    0.542410] bridge: automatic filtering via arp/ip/ip6tables has been deprecated. Update your scripts to load br_netfilter if you need this.
[    0.555226] 8021q: 802.1Q VLAN Support v1.8
[    0.566603] VFS: Mounted root (squashfs filesystem) readonly on device 31:5.
[    0.574979] Freeing unused kernel memory: 208K (803cc000 - 80400000)
[    1.128553] SQUASHFS error: xz decompression failed, data probably corrupt
[    1.135541] SQUASHFS error: squashfs_read_data failed to read block 0x8fc0e
[    1.147362] SQUASHFS error: xz decompression failed, data probably corrupt
[    1.154366] SQUASHFS error: squashfs_read_data failed to read block 0x8fc0e
[    1.161513] Starting init: /etc/preinit exists but couldn't execute it (error -14)
[    1.171781] Starting init: /sbin/init exists but couldn't execute it (error -14)
[    1.182577] Starting init: /bin/sh exists but couldn't execute it (error -14)
[    1.189874] Kernel panic - not syncing: No working init found.  Try passing init= option to kernel. See Linux Documentation/init.txt for guidance.

cusackph

I put my working Omega2+ in the mini dock and the reset button doesn't work at all, so it looks there's like a problem with the dock. sigh
I've got an arduino dock 2, a spare usb drive, and a raspberry pi. Is there any way that I could connect to the omega using the gpio pins on the pi and arduino dock and flash the firmware that way? I know for a fact that the reset button on my arduino dock works.

cusackph

Followed these instructions to get my pi3 set up to connect via serial:
https://hallard.me/enable-serial-port-on-raspberry-pi/
While the omega2 led would blink in extremely rapid fashion while connected to the TX/RX0 or TX/RX1 ports, it wouldn't connect, most of the time I got a 'port busy' or similar message from the pi terminal.

Should I try ordering something like this?: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014PBYER4
Hopefully I'm not just shouting into the void here, fingers crossed someone smarter than me in this community (there are many of you ) can help me figure this out.

WereCatf

@cusackph said in Might have bricked my Omega2+, can't connect via serial:

Should I try ordering something like this?: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014PBYER4
Hopefully I'm not just shouting into the void here, fingers crossed someone smarter than me in this community (there are many of you ) can help me figure this out.

Yup, CP2102- and CP2104-based adapters work fine and peachy with the Omega2. I have a bunch of CH340G-based ones too, and they have trouble working with it.

cusackph

Great, ordered! Will be here on Monday. Thank you! Gonna take a break from these things for the weekend, submitted a ticket re: the mini dock's reset button not working as that seems to be pretty important.

Zogg Baubas

I'v got myself TTL COM PC-PL2303HX recently, its a TTL UART - USB converter. Works well with Ubuntu and Omega.

cusackph

Fixed! The usb-serial adapter linked above showed up today. Steps for those curious or who haven't done this before (like me :)):

Plugged usb-serial adapter into Macbook Pro
Installed the driver for the Omega2+ (already had this installed but for those who don't: https://docs.onion.io/omega2-docs/connecting-to-the-omega-terminal.html#connecting-to-the-omega-terminal-serial)
Set up screen on OSX using Terminal (screen bash, screen /dev/tty.SLAB_USBtoUART 115200)
Connected the adapter to the Arduino dock serial ports
Plugged in power to Arduino dock w/ reset held
Restored via usb drive (downloaded latest firmware from repo, named it omega2.bin, put on root of FAT32 formatted flash drive).

Thank you @WereCatf & @Zogg-Baubas for replying!

WereCatf

@cusackph You're welcome, just glad you got it going!

Marty Mickelson

@cusackph This probably makes me sound like a total n00b but how did you connect the Omega to your USB adapter?
I am guessing you plugged the USB into your computer. Then wires with pins on each end (don't know the official name) to connect the middle two USB adapter wires to the TX and RX holes in your arduino? I don't have the arduino adapter so I'm trying to figure out how to do this with the expansion board. The expansion board has TX+/- and RX+/-.

cusackph

@Marty-Mickelson No worries, this is my first time working with this sort of thing too. I connected ground to ground, TX on the USB adapter to RX0 on the Arduino Dock 2, RX on the USB adapter to TX0 on the Arduino Dock 2. I didn't worry about the power pins at all. The Expansion Dock has GPIO ports for TX1/RX1, I don't know if they'll work for this but I can test when I get home.

Marty Mickelson

@cusackph You rock. I installed again and it was listed. I did the steps and voila! I'm back in action. Well, I'm back to where I was when the console wouldn't show any apps after restarting. But at least now I can troubleshoot something besides a paperweight.

Thanks a ton!

Anders Öster

A noob here too ) I have ordered this adapter : http://www.banggood.com/CJMCU-CP2102-USB-To-TTLSerial-Module-UART-STC-Downloader-p-970993.html

Now I notice it says RX1 and TX0 on it. Will it work for the Omega 2+?

WereCatf

@Anders-Öster said in Might have bricked my Omega2+, can't connect via serial:

Now I notice it says RX1 and TX0 on it. Will it work for the Omega 2+?

It actually says "RXI" and "TXO", not "RX1" and "TX0" -- they're letters, not numbers; the "I" and "O" just stand for input and output. And yes, that dongle will work just fine.

Anders Öster

@WereCatf Great, thanks.