Bricked my Multiplus II GX during downgrade

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xzv asked Feb 12, '24

Bricked my Multiplus II GX during downgrade

Hi,

because I'm investigating a potential bug, I tried to downgrade my Multiplus II GX to a previous version.

I followed this guide which says it's okay to do this:

Note that while backporting is no problem in general, it may be that some settings are reset to their default values. Be sure to check this.

I loaded the .swu file (venus-swu-nanopi-20181016100243-v2.20.swu) from the nanopi folder onto an USB stick and started the downgrade via the Remote Console from v3.14 to v2.20.

After a while the screen went blank and this is the situation I'm stuck in.

The GX is not reachable in the network via Wifi or Ethernet. Pushing the reset button didn't help either.

The Inverter card is still accessible through VE Connect.

Any chance to force an upgrade from an attached USB drive? How can I recover from this state where the GX is "broken"?

Multiplus-II firmware update

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nickdb answered · Feb 12 at 08:53 AM

As Matt said, that was a bad idea. With dependencies between the GX and the Multi leaping that far back was unwise.

A reflash may well resolve it for you.

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xzv commented · Feb 12 at 09:11 AM

Now I know that :)

How do I reflash it? Providing the GX with the venus-data.tgz file as Matthias suggested didn't change the situation.

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Alex Pescaru answered · Feb 12 at 09:16 AM

Hi @XZv

For recover: https://community.victronenergy.com/questions/204255/cerbo-gx-bricked-how-to-recover.html

I've also written to you in the other thread with CAN dropped messages what to do.

Alex

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xzv commented · Feb 12 at 09:21 AM

Will the flashing also work with an USB drive, as the MP II GX doesn't have a SD card slot?

Once I've unbricked the device I will continue investigating on that CAN issue :) Thanks!

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Alex Pescaru xzv commented · Feb 12 at 09:59 AM

I suppose so...

Maybe we can ask Matthijs if it's the case. @mvader (Victron Energy)

Thank you!

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xzv Alex Pescaru commented · Feb 12 at 10:03 AM

I got it to work. :) Maybe it can help someone else later on how it worked:

Because it's a Multiplus II GX, I downloaded the nanpi image from here and flashed it to a USB stick. The device seemed to do something, but it didn't work, the display remained blank. What helped was to open the device and insert an SD card into the SD card slot of the nanopi.

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Alex Pescaru xzv commented · Feb 12 at 11:29 AM

Any SD card?

Because if this is the case, the firmware, in some conditions, may remain stuck on SD card detection step and maybe it's room for improvement on this.

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xzv Alex Pescaru commented · Feb 12 at 12:24 PM

The SD card was of course flashed with that same nanopi image I had on the USB stick before :).

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Alex Pescaru xzv commented · Feb 12 at 12:28 PM

So, regarding your question, it seems that it updates the firmware correctly only from SD card, right?

Here's what I've also find:

https://community.victronenergy.com/questions/77486/fixing-dead-multiplus-ii-gx-applying-nanopi-instal.html

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xzv Alex Pescaru commented · Feb 12 at 01:43 PM

Exactly, only from SD cards, not via USB. The problem in the post you linked was also that he locked himself out and could access the terminal again by using the serial console. I didn't try it out in my case but I guess that wouldn't have helped.

Thanks your your help!

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Answer 1 · 2024-02-12T08:37:26Z

Matthias Lange - DE answered · Feb 12 at 08:37 AM

2.20 is a huge step, it's over 5 years old!
Why did you do such a big jump?

You could try a factory reset:
https://www.victronenergy.com/media/pg/CCGX/en/reset-to-factory-defaults-procedure.html

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xzv commented · Feb 12 at 09:13 AM

Thanks for the hint. The .tgz file didn't seem to help, I see no display content and it's not creating its Wifi access point.

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