Modem can't connect

Hardware
1

Have a modem and it has been working fine. But it stopped connecting yesterday and even after a power cycle it still wont connect. I am running a trace

{“req”: “card.version”}
{“body”:{“org”:“Blues Wireless”,“product”:“Notecard”,“version”:“notecard-1.5.5”,“ver_major”:1,“ver_minor”:5,“ver_patch”:5,“ver_build”:13080,“built”:“May 28 2021 17:11:58”},“version”:“notecard-1.5.5.13080”,“device”:“dev:864475044208493”,“name”:“Blues Wireless Notecard”,“sku”:“NOTE-NBGL500”,“board”:“1.11”,“api”:1}
{‘body’: {‘org’: ‘Blues Wireless’, ‘product’: ‘Notecard’, ‘version’: ‘notecard-1.5.5’, ‘ver_major’: 1, ‘ver_minor’: 5, ‘ver_patch’: 5, ‘ver_build’: 13080, ‘built’: ‘May 28 2021 17:11:58’}, ‘version’: ‘notecard-1.5.5.13080’, ‘device’: ‘dev:864475044208493’, ‘name’: ‘Blues Wireless Notecard’, ‘sku’: ‘NOTE-NBGL500’, ‘board’: ‘1.11’, ‘api’: 1}
{“req”: “card.wireless”}
{“status”:"{modem-on}",“net”:{}}
{‘status’: ‘{modem-on}’, ‘net’: {}}
<bound method OpenI2C.Transaction of <notecard.notecard.OpenI2C object at 0xb6722a70>>
{“req”: “hub.sync”}
{}
{}

{“req”: “hub.sync.status”}
{“alert”:true,“status”:“modem: can’t connect (111 min remaining) {network}{extended-network-failure}”,“time”:1625442477,“completed”:127}
{‘alert’: True, ‘status’: “modem: can’t connect (111 min remaining) {network}{extended-network-failure}”, ‘time’: 1625442477, ‘completed’: 127}
{“req”: “card.status”}
{“status”:"{normal}",“storage”:1,“time”:1625441737}
{‘status’: ‘{normal}’, ‘storage’: 1, ‘time’: 1625441737}
{“req”: “card.wireless”}
{“status”:"{modem-on}",“net”:{}}
{‘status’: ‘{modem-on}’, ‘net’: {}}

{“req”: “card.wireless”}

{“status”:"{modem-on}",“net”:{}}

{‘status’: ‘{modem-on}’, ‘net’: {}}

Trace showed nothing…

{“req”: “card.trace”, “stop”: true}
{“text”:""}
{‘text’: ‘’}

Was connected fine, 4 bars, but then it just stopped.

2

It came back, I did another power cycle and it came back. Can anyone explain what these Device Health messages mean?

Mon 08:59:52 AM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [13080])

Sun 11:26:52 AM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [13080])

Sat 01:52:05 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [13080])

06-28 03:03:28 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [13080])

06-28 06:38:33 AM: boot (relaunch after DFU [13080])

06-27 05:00:26 PM: boot (sync watchdog [12200] [4.76V] [I:2=T] G:P:W~ M:P:W900 U:W~ R:P:W~ S:W300 T:W~ I:W~)

06-27 02:38:43 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-27 02:30:01 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-27 02:01:18 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-27 01:54:44 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 08:02:26 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 04:30:25 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 04:14:08 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 03:04:19 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 02:51:37 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 02:46:49 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 02:31:10 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 01:56:05 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

06-26 01:53:45 PM: boot (brown-out & hard reset [12200])

3

Possibly power issues if mounted on a Pi?

4

Hi @cshannon and welcome to the forum!

I agree with Francois in that my first guess would be a power issue. I haven’t experienced this with a Pi, but it could be if you are on a battery pack I suppose.

One thing you can try is to provide an additional power-only USB cable to the Notecarrier’s micro-USB port (assuming you are not on a Pi).

Thanks,
Rob

5

We are on our own carrier board. But there is a pi and we have 5v coming externally on the carrier board. Should have enough power.

Have no problems on the Pi 4. As I understood the notecard docs you dont need 5v, can run on less, we are only dipping to 4.79. So I dont understand why the network drops.

{“minutes”:321,“hours”:40,“value”:4.8051901923317045,“vmin”:4.77,“vmax”:4.98,“vavg”:4.811,“daily”:0.04}
{‘minutes’: 321, ‘hours’: 40, ‘value’: 4.805190192331705, ‘vmin’: 4.77, ‘vmax’: 4.98, ‘vavg’: 4.811, ‘daily’: 0.04}

Any insights into what to look at would be helpful.

6

Hi @cshannon,
When the cellular modem transmits, for example when it attempts to register on a cellular network, there is a spike in current consumption of several hundred milliamps. If the power supply does not have sufficient instantaneous current capacity it can lead to brownout and restart issues like those you are seeing. These spikes are so brief in duration that you would need a scope or something like a joulescope to see them - you would not see them with a DVM or card.voltage.
Thanks
Sean