Nice. Looks like I have a project to work on today. Thanks brother. I had forgotten about batch files and the old autorun.bat. I've been playing with Windows since version 3.1 but have forgotten more then I currently know. LOL.

@Merne, hope I didn't burse your feelings brother. I was just kidding around. I appreacheate all tips and help. Actually a low tech start button extension rod is a pretty good idea and work around. I just like to automate things. I guess I just lazy.

@Dave. I hope you get it working with the batch files.  No bruised feeling at all.  It was an off the calf idea.  I did laughed pretty hard when I seen your reply.

Well, I did have success with the batch files for loading everything up through windows. However with everything considered, including the needed delay of ARC to start up, it was just taking to long to get the robot up and running for my liking. Also I was having other problems like my second WIFI connection using a USB WIFI dongle starting up. For some reason the second WIFI network was not starting. I need that for an EZB that connects to the SCB in AP mode for ARC to connect to. Maybe it was another reason like a conflict of something but I got frustrated and moved to a different approach.

I decided to try my first idea of installing the CMOS battery to keep system time and BIOS settings even though I need to push the Rock Pi X's power button for 3 seconds to start the boot process. *I removed the surface mounted Remote Power button Port from the SBC and soldered on a pigtail. If you recall I did this because I can't find the correct connector unless I buy a battery from Rock Pi's china vendor (I don't want to wait a month to get this done). It was a very small area to solder in but I was able to do it. The header circuit for this port is a two wire connection. One solder pad goes into the board's components and the other is a ground that when the circuit is closed it simply shorts the circuit to ground. This ground pad was so close the the other component side pad that I instead soldered to one of the grounded support braces that was originally anchoring the pin housing I had removed.   *The pigtail I added goes directly to a time delay relay that closes the circuit for 3 seconds like the remote power button was used for to start the boot process.  *I found that the relay can't be closed at first powerup. It needs to be set to delay about 4 seconds before operating while the SBC power's up into standby, then have the relay close.  *The only thing with the Time Delayed Relay I chose is that if it's set to close after a set time delay, there is no way to turn it off and open the circuit back up (like removing your finger from the power button). The circuit stays closed through the boot and start up process until the robot is shut down later on. However this doesn't seem to hurt or bother anything. Windows and ARC remain running just fine until shutdown. The SBC seems to ignore the closed button push until the next power up when the process is repeated. I don't know if having this closed and grounded circuit is an optimal way to stay running though. I need to look further into this.

However, for now, everything seems to be running nicely.

@Nink, even though I didn't use the batch file approach I really appreacheate your advice and help.

Hey @Dave glad you have a solution. I am going to need to solve this for my robot dog that has a rock pi x when it is finished so I was really interested in you solving this. Honestly a bios update from the rock pi x so the SBC doesnt need a bitten press when a cmos battery is installed should be the real solution.  I have already blown up one Rock Pi x from a power overload when the BLDC motors  caused a power surge and I hadn’t put in a power isolator.  I tried to replace Surface mount  fuse and failed miserably so I am not keen on attacking mine with a soldering iron.

Well, I may have spoken too soon.

Everything does work like I want during a current power up session. When I insurt the WIFI dongle into a USB port a second WIFI network called WIFI 2 appears in the dropdown tab at the top of the available WIFI list. I connect the AP mode EZB to WIFI 2. I can then manually connect all my EZBs in ARC when they have been set up. These are Com 3, COM 4, the AP mode EZB (once it's manually connected to the WIFI 2 dongle) and the IoTiny that is connects to the AP mode EZB. They connect in that order. Everything works nicely in ARC that runs through these Ezbs.

However if I shut down the robot (with the onboard Rock Pi X running ARC) then reboot everything the Rock Pi X running Winn 10 will not properly handle the USB WIFI Dongle that the AP EZB is connects to. While Windows 10 is starting up it will either not see the Dongle and not list it in the available WIFI networks drop down tab as an extra WIFI connection or if WIFI 2 dongle is available in the dropdown tab the AP mode EZB will not auto connect to it. I do have the  "Automatically Connect" box checked when I picked the AP mode EZB for this WIFI 2 connection.

I've tried many times to get WIN 10 that is running on the Rock Pi x upon startup to find the USB dongle and auto connect to the AP mode EZB with no luck. After Win starts I can pull the dongle out of the USB port, reinsert it and then Win will find it, list it and I can quickly connect the AP mode EZB to it. ARC will then connect and be able to use that EZB.

Not sure what changed as I thought all this was working before, many times. I do not know if this is a start up timing issue with Windows running on the Rock Pi X, a conflict or both. However I do know it has nothing to do with ARC. I've tried to boot into windows with ARC not loading at Windows startup with the same results. It's got something to do with the USB Dongle inserted into the Rock Pi x's USB port and how windows 10 loads and handles it at start up. The dongle I'm using is the one that EZ Robot includes in the box when buying a new EZB v4/2. I've tried updating the dongle's drivers but neither I or Windows knows where to find the new drivers for this generic looking dongle.

Device Manager does show this wifi dongle working with the drivers installed.

Maybe a new non generic WIFI dongle is needed. One I can get drivers for.

Instead of removing dongle, if you enable / disable network adapter does it work?  If so you may want to try. OH NO Not another batch file. LOL

https://www.action1.com/blog/2019/10/25/how-to-enable-disable-or-restart-network-adapter/

LOL! Thanks Nink. I'll have a look. I think I did try this approach with no result. I'll look closer and give it a try. I'm just about to move on from using a WIFi dongle with the Rock Pi X. I don't seem to be making any progress. I'm starting to think the Rock Pi can't do what I want with using a dongle for an extra wifi connection.

I so glad I found this old thread.  I just came across this same ARC message when my Rock Pi started up. Before trying the CMOS battery route and it's associated caveats , I'm trying the Task Scheduler with a 2 min delay. The delay start works most of the time , but I might bump it up to 3 minutes to make sure.

I'm using ARC and Rock Pi to give our modified Meccano robot's some onboard smarts.  My students really enjoy them and there is no hurry for startup.

Thanks again Nink and Dave.