Asked — Edited

Ez-B 4 Stopped Working

Received my log awaited order. Glad it arrived.

I contacted you as soon as I opened the box and found I was missing a camera and had a servo instead. I believe we have this straightened out and you are sending me my missing camera.

I just got around to trying out my new EZ-B hardware and have found two additional problems with my order.

One of the two EZ-B V4 I purchased appears to be bad and there are two problems with the Humanoid Head with Camera.

I appear to have one bad EZ-B v4. I think it was working initially but it suddenly stopped functioning just after I set it up to work on my home network and was testing out the Humanoid Head with Camera that I purchased from you. I was in ARC setting up the Horizontal (Left Right) head movement servo when it disconnected and quit working.

I reset the EZ-B V4.

The bad EZ-B v4 makes no sounds even when first turned on like the other one.

It does appear to come up in access point mode and I am able to connect it to my home wireless network.

After it is on my home network it responds to a ping and the web page is accessable.

The unit does not make any sounds though from the web page either.

When I try to connect with ARC I get this message.

EZB 0: 9/21/2014 9:11 PM - TCP Server stopped 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - Attempting connection on 192.168.1.107:23 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - Comm Err: System.IO.IOException: Unable to read data from the transport connection: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond. ---> System.Net.Sockets.SocketException: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond at System.Net.Sockets.Socket.Receive(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size, SocketFlags socketFlags) at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) at System.IO.Stream.ReadByte() at EZ_B.EZB.(Int32 , Byte[] ) 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - BbytesToExpect: 1 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - U Received: 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - Disconnected 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - Connection Failed: System.Exception: Controller Not Responding at EZ_B.EZB.Connect(String hostname, Int32 baudRate) 9/21/2014 9:12 PM - Disconnected

EZB 1: 9/21/2014 9:11 PM - TCP Server stopped

EZB 2: 9/21/2014 9:11 PM - TCP Server stopped

EZB 3: 9/21/2014 9:11 PM - TCP Server stopped

EZB 4: 9/21/2014 9:11 PM - TCP Server stopped

The bad unit does not make any sounds even when I try connecting to the EZ-B v4 from ARC.

When the Humanoid Head with Camera is attached to the bad EZ-B v4 the I2C LED Matrix lights up.

I measure 3.3V on the analog port voltage pins.

I am powering The EZ-B V4 with the 12V power brick I purchased with my EZ-B V3 Developers kit. I have a 5V 3A inline regulator which I am using to provide external servo power since the servos are not rated for 12V. The inline 5V regulator is putting out a solid 5.2V DC. All connection have heat shrink tubing on them.

Fortunately I purchased a second EZ-B V4 from you and this second unit works great with the same setup that I was using when the first EZ-B V4 went bad.

I have connected the Head to my good EZ-B V4 and it appears to have a couple of problems.

One of the corner LEDs in the Arrays has a malfunctioning green LED. Everything works for Red and Blue and all but one of the green LEDs light up on green.

The second problem with the head is that the servo that moves the head horizontally left and right is not functioning. I was configuring this when the first EZ-B V4 went bad (The servo appeared to be working). The EZ-B V4 may have taken out the servo or the servo may have taken out the EZ-B v4. The servo was moving as I adjusted the minimum and maximum servo settings.

I have tried it with my second good EZ-B V4. And the head horizontally (left and right) servo no longer functions. The Head vertical servo was connected when things went bad and it appears fine. I had not gotten to the point of setting up the port for that servo yet. I do not believe the problem was caused by my inline 5V regulator.

The camera in the head is working great with the good EZ-B V4 as is the Vertical Head movement servo.

I can swap bad parts of the Humanoid head if you send me the parts.

If there is any more debug information you need from me on the Bad EZ-B V4 please let me know.

I am looking forward to recieving the camera I was missing. It may end up installed in a MAKI 3D Printable Humanoid Robot from Hello Robo Inc. I just finished testing the MAKI with my good EZ-B V4 and intial testing looks good. I need the carmera to figure out how to install it in the MAKI. It was a lot of fun 3D Printing all those pieces.

I have been printing parts and have all the AX-12 servo installed. One of the EZ-B V4 I ordered was for the MAKI. The other was from experimental robot along with the Humanoid head. I am looking forward to upgrading my experimental robot from an EZ-B V3 to an EZ-B V4. Hope we can work all this out soon.

I can swap bad parts of the Humanoid head as well as the EZ-B V4, if you send me the parts.

If I need to ship parts back to you I would appreaciate some form of prepaid shipping.

Thanks for the great products,


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#1  

Is there any indication that the bad EZB is getting power at all? If it is completely dead... (no leds or sound), it could be the 20amp main fuse in the base that could be blown...

EDIT Never mind the fuse idea as I see you mentioned that it still shows up in your wifi list...

Maybe it's best you contact EZ Robot directly via Contact Us ....

#2  

Thanks for the help.

I was told to try here because EZ Robot could not answer my question through "Contact Us". I am at a lose where to get the defective parts replaced. Do you have any contacts through EZ Robot send them my way.

Thanks

#3  

On the Contact Us form, there is a dropdown where you select Warranty Claims. Fill that out, explaining that the sound is not working on one of your EZ-B's and they will arrange a replacement (they may have you try some basic troubleshooting, like opening the case and making sure the spring contacts that connect the speaker to the board aren't stuck).

Alan

#5  

Hi guys,

I directed him back here to the forum to get some more help and information on whether this is a warranty problem. It was too much technical hardware stuff for me to understand, so I was hoping we could get some troubleshooting and perhaps confirm that it's defective parts causing the problem before we process a warranty replacement!

@ITDEPT, you definitely did right by contacting us first. The problem was only that I could not make sense of it, and figured some other people can:) I am just going to ping Jeremie on it, and once we get a bit more info, if it turns out it's a warranty issue, I'll be handling it for you.

Thanks for all the help guys!

Chrissi

PRO
Canada
#6  

Thanks Alan, i was just going to suggest that but you beat me to it.:D

@ITDEPT your issues are possibly unrelated.

I would first check the spring contacts on the speaker, extend them a little and try placing the EZ-B back into the enclosure.

As for the horizontal servo, is your inline voltage regulator adjustable? You could try increasing the voltage going to the horizontal micro servo and see if that works.

You could also open up the head and remove the horizontal servo backing and see if maybe a wire pulled loose off it's circuit board, this might have accidentally happened during handling of the head.

#7  

What about the LED Array? If I am am going into surgery I might as well look into that too!

PRO
Canada
#8  

Oops sorry I forgot about that, that will have to be sent back for warranty unfortunately, it sounds like a manufacturing defect.

#9  

The bad EZ-B will not connect to the desktop sofware. The good EZ-B connects fine. And Ican get to the Web Page of the Bad one. Is it bad or is there something I can try on the bad one

PRO
Canada
#10  

@ITDEPT what does the LED on the top board do when you power it up, does it flash blue? Is there a small red LED lit up by the reset button?

#11  

Removed the back from the Servo. All Wires are still connected well. Solder joints look good. Nothing appears obviously wrong with the circuit board inside the servo.

#12  

The 5V inline regulator is a fixed voltage (Measured it a 5.2V with a volt meter). It is capable of handling 3 AMPs. So it should have no trouble with a single servo. It works fine with the other servo in the head.

Testing the bad EZ-B V4 now. Tried to adjust the springs up a little as discussed in the forum message you pointed me to and it sometimes starts to make noise and stops. Tried plugging and unplugging power several times. Sometimes it makes one note. sometimes a couple of notes. It never gets to the point where it starts talking. The sound just seems to stop mid note.

Powered up the bad EZ-B v4.

No sound this time.

Pressed EZ-B V4 reset button.

Got While light -- flashing green -- flashing blue. No red lights.

EZ-B V4 is accessible in access point mode. Web Page is available.

Diagnostic Page comes up fine. When pushing sound buttons on the Diagnostic Web Page, No Sounds can be heard.

Lights is still flashing Blue.

Went to EZ-B V4 wifi configuration page.

Set up for internal network hit submit.

Solid Green Light, Fast Flashing Green Light and slow Flashing Green Light.

Can now access EZ-B V4 Web page from my home network.

Still no sound from Diagnotic Page.

EZ-B V4 responds to Ping, EZ-B V4 Web page comes up.

Trying to Connect with ARC now.

9/22/2014 7:56 PM - Attempting connection on 192.168.1.107:23 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - Comm Err: System.IO.IOException: Unable to read data from the transport connection: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond. ---> System.Net.Sockets.SocketException: A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond at System.Net.Sockets.Socket.Receive(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size, SocketFlags socketFlags) at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) at System.IO.Stream.ReadByte() at EZ_B.EZB.(Int32 , Byte[] ) 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - BbytesToExpect: 1 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - U Received: 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - Disconnected 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - Connection Failed: System.Exception: Controller Not Responding at EZ_B.EZB.Connect(String hostname, Int32 baudRate) 9/22/2014 7:56 PM - Disconnected

The Problem is not just with the speaker.

#13  

It looks like the processor that manages the wifi is working fine, but the processor that communicates with EZ-Buildler is not functioning. The guess is that it is the same one that drives the audio to the speaker and controls the servos. I tried plugging in the good servo on the head and trying the servo commands on the Diagnostic page. Nothing happens.