Screen freeze - Practically cannot use the machine

I have my 1F since about a year and have not used it much because time constraints. Everything was fine in the beginning. Then the screen (7" display) started freezing up. The only remedy was to restart the controller. It was occurring occasionally and after the machine has been idle for some time. Over time, I started seeing it more frequently and with shorter idle time. Yesterday I turned it on after, may be a couple of months. And now, it freezes within minutes to the point I cannot do anything.
It is not connected to wifi.

Thanks for any and all help and guidance.
kr

Hi @krem,

Sounds like it’s the controller that’s locking up, and the actual monitor is just displaying the signal its being fed if truly the only resolution is to restart the controller. Monitors themselves normally don’t lock up. But if that were the case, just restarting the monitor should put it back in action. Very important to correctly identify the source of the issue (controller or monitor).

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@Machinist Thanks for the hint. Here is what I did after reading your advice:
Turned on the display
Turned on the controller
Homing message came up and I did home the machine
Turned on game pad
Using game pad I lowered the bit (wanted to probe Z)
Touched Probe Z on the display but the display had already frozen
Game pad still worked
Turned off the display by pressing the power button on the display
Waited a few seconds and turned the display on
Display was still frozen
Turned off display and unplugged power cord
Waited a few seconds and connected the display power cord back
Display was still frozen
Game page still worked

Any further test that I should perform to diagnose the problem?

Good diagnostic actions there, @krem. Since the Z probe still worked, it would lead one to believe that the controller itself was still operational. Makes me wonder if there’s an issue with the video output on the RPI computer in the controller. I would contact @OnefinityCNC via. email (even if your machine happens to be out of warranty), they may have seen this issue before and have an idea of what to do.
Have you updated the controller firmware to the latest version?

Thanks @Machinist. I will contact OneFinity support. No, I have not updated firmware. It is still the same as when I received it.

Update the firmware to 1.0.9.

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I could not update the firmware because screen was freezing within a minute.
I connected my laptop using an ethernet cable and then I was able to upgrade the firmware to 1.0.9.
After the update and 7" display power reset, the problem is gone. At least for 5-7 minutes that I had I could use the 7" display without any issues.

Thanks everyone for guidance.

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Update:
Today I turned machine on and after about 15 minutes, left the machine idle/ untouched for two hours. After 2 hours I found out that the display was frozen. I will test it further to check if it freezes after one hour of idle time.

When the screen freezes does it also freeze up on a network connected device? I had an first time odd occurrence today that I figured wasn’t possible where the display connected to the controller via hdmi reported “Disconnected” while my PC running Fusion in the other room was fine and the Onefinity continued to run the remainder of the file.

No. The laptop didn’t freeze. I connected my laptop using ethernet cable and it was this laptop that allowed me to update firmware. By the way, I didn’t get the “Disconnected” message ever. The screen just used to become totally non-responsive.
After the firmware update, it still freezes but not so quickly. Today I worked for about half an hour and then left it idle for about 15-20 minutes and it froze again. I now fear it may start freezing more quickly like before.
I am hoping OneFinity will provide me a solution for this screen freezing problem.

My screen does the same thing it freezes doesn’t even show that the machine is running cuz I’m able to run it off my phone or laptop via Wi-Fi I pray that one infinity or someone answers to the solution so we could find the answer thank you no volatility

Frozen screen after long pause. Any prevention and /or recovery solutions?
Journeyman X-50
At the start of the carve I had connected via WIFI and started a long 3D carve (22 hours). After 2 hours, I had to get some sleep. I paused the project, specifically at a point when the bit was raised off the project. The screen indicated “Holding”.
6 hours later I went to resume the project. The touch screen was locked up and the > “play” would not respond. I had left the WIFI connection active while I slept. The screen indicated “Disconnected”. I attempted to re-connect with no success. Once before I had successfully performed this process with no glitches. For safety reasons I felt I had no choice but to turn off the Onefinity via the silver button. I had to go to work. Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.

Hey B.,

if that happens, you could ping the ip address of the controller (or ping ‘onefinity.local’ if configured with a link-local address) from a remote computer and if it responds, try to log in via ssh with user: bbmc, password: onefinity, and this way see if the system is still up. If it doesn’t respond to ping, it is likely the system is frozen.

Successful ping:

# ping onefinity.local
PING onefinity.local (169.254.234.237) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from onefinity.local (169.254.234.237): icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.369 ms
64 bytes from onefinity.local (169.254.234.237): icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.467 ms
64 bytes from onefinity.local (169.254.234.237): icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.504 ms
64 bytes from onefinity.local (169.254.234.237): icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=0.564 ms
^C
--- onefinity.local ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 3003ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 0.369/0.476/0.564/0.070 ms
# ping 169.254.234.237
PING 169.254.234.237 (169.254.234.237) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 169.254.234.237: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.424 ms
64 bytes from 169.254.234.237: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.442 ms
64 bytes from 169.254.234.237: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.510 ms
64 bytes from 169.254.234.237: icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=0.460 ms
^C
--- 169.254.234.237 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 3052ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 0.424/0.459/0.510/0.032 ms

Unsuccessful ping:

# ping onefinity.local
ping: onefinity.local: Name or service not known

# ping 169.254.234.237
PING 169.254.234.237 (169.254.234.237) 56(84) bytes of data.
From 192.168.░░░.░░ icmp_seq=1 Destination Host Unreachable
From 192.168.░░░.░░ icmp_seq=2 Destination Host Unreachable
From 192.168.░░░.░░ icmp_seq=3 Destination Host Unreachable
From 192.168.░░░.░░ icmp_seq=4 Destination Host Unreachable
^C
--- 169.254.234.237 ping statistics ---
7 packets transmitted, 0 received, +4 errors, 100% packet loss, time 6128ms
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Hey B.

this was discussed the other day. When pausing, make a screenshot or a photo of the screen showing top of CONTROL page, or write down the values in the absolute and the offsets columns of all axes on CONTROL page. If the system is frozen or power failed and has to be rebooted, don’t home the machine, and don’t move any axis, and you can then apply this method.

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If you reboot just the screen it usually will return to an active screen. Try a new usb cord. I also had this issue but what I determined is my usb cords go bad quickly. I have had to change my usb cord 3 times in the last 2 years. Not sure if its just the humidity here in Louisiana but I keep spare cords around for this very issue. I have tried beefier ones the second time it went bad but I did not get any more life out of it. About every 6 months when I see this issue I know its time to change the cord.

Thank you for the replies. 1F directed me to the screen flickering EMI thread. I will follow up on both of the suggestions you have provided and the 1F suggestion.
Follow up question. I felt I had to kill the system because I had attempted to press play and no response took place. I had to leave. I felt is was unsafe to leave it in a state where it could “wake up” and start running.
If I had been able to connect a LAN cable to the controller (strung from garage to home closet (16 m), would I be able to get control of the system? (assuming the controller was not frozen)

Yes. The touchscreen and remote connection are just web accessed GUI pages. You can see at the top of the touchscreen there is a refresh button and tabs just like any other web based GUI. Turning on or off the screen will not have any effect on the controller itself but may restore the link. I use a web connection to load all my files and set the machine up every day so this can work in conjunction with the touchscreen as well. One note to mention. If you have a controller hooked up to your pc and your remote into your machine the controller will become active. I have had issues where my pc controller was laying with a button pressed and when I remoted into my machine it caused it to hang up.

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Thank you. I will try this technique too. By the way, FYI I am in in a very dry part of California. So, if we both have the same issue, it is probably not humidity.

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Hi [Aiph5u], I intend to use “this method” to attempt recovery of my project. Any reason I should not re- probe-z the z axis, just prior to starting the program over. I am fairly confident the X and Y axes would not have moved but mean ol’ Mr gravity can be insidious to the Z axes. Thanks for all the tips and info.

Hey @CNC4Fun,

agree with Z probing. If you don’t have a screenshot or the values written down of the moment when you started pause, you have to find the values in the log file. You need to find the offsets first, then the last position before pause.

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