IP/webpage issues

[lumpylipton]

Hi, brand new Robo-tank user here, just finished up my kit.  I'm running into something odd in hooking it to my network.  The controller connects to my router running DHCP, grabs a local IP address and correctly shows my WAN address.  I can ping the LAN address it grabs.  However if I try to browse to the local IP:7626 it just times out, I never get the username/password page.  Speaking of that, I cannot generate a username /pw.  Hitting the button does nothing, and the username and password fields show as 4 character non alpha numeric characters, see attached picture.  I even went into the sd card text files and changed the username/pw but it always shows up as these weird characters.  

Any ideas?
   

[Rob F]

Hi lumpylipton, sorry it's acting up, I haven't seen this issue before. I'm wondering if it's having trouble reading the SD card on controller. Can you try plugging the SD card directly in the w5100 Ethernet shield to see if that fixes it?

Also using the Arduino IDE for programming, if you connect the controller and open the Serial Monitor in the Arduino IDE you'll see some text show up like below.

Initializing sd card...
SUCCESS - sd card initialized.
SUCCESS - Found index.html file.
eepromValue: 50

[fietsenrex]

Did you browse te 192.168.100.129:7626 or Just to 7626?

[lumpylipton]

Hi lumpylipton, sorry it's acting up, I haven't seen this issue before. I'm wondering if it's having trouble reading the SD card on controller. Can you try plugging the SD card directly in the w5100 Ethernet shield to see if that fixes it?

Also using the Arduino IDE for programming, if you connect the controller and open the Serial Monitor in the Arduino IDE you'll see some text show up like below.

Initializing sd card...
SUCCESS - sd card initialized.
SUCCESS - Found index.html file.
eepromValue: 50

Hi Rob,
The card is plugged directly into the controller, I'm not yet using the extension cable.  I had a chance to reseat the card before work this morning, same issue.  I'll try the Arduino IDE tonight and let you know what I see.
Thanks
Warren

---

Did you browse te 192.168.100.129:7626 or Just to 7626?

Hi Fietsenrex,

Yes, I browsed to 192.168.100.129:7626.

Thanks for your response.
Warren

[Rob F]

Yeah see what the IDE serial monitor says, in the bottom right corner you have to change the baud rate to 115200 otherwise you'll get garbage in the monitor. I have seen some w5100 go bad related to the SD card but I'm a little surprised as I did test it before sending it. I have a feeling that's it as everything else seems to work, it's probably timing out because it can't access the html file on SD card. The SD card uses digital pin 4 on the shield for SD card, maybe try gently lifting the w5100 shield from the board and bending pin 4 slightly as it could be a bad connection.

[lumpylipton]

Yeah see what the IDE serial monitor says, in the bottom right corner you have to change the baud rate to 115200 otherwise you'll get garbage in the monitor. I have seen some w5100 go bad related to the SD card but I'm a little surprised as I did test it before sending it. I have a feeling that's it as everything else seems to work, it's probably timing out because it can't access the html file on SD card. The SD card uses digital pin 4 on the shield for SD card, maybe try gently lifting the w5100 shield from the board and bending pin 4 slightly as it could be a bad connection.

Yeah Rob, that's the problem.  I get this in the monitor:
Initializing sd card...
ERROR - sd card initialization failed!
ERROR - Can't find index.html file!
eepromValue: 50
Starting Controller -------------------2046
Startup Complete -------------------19186
Startup Complete -------------------19388
Connecting to Network -------------------34695
Alert To Email Address: 
Alert From Email Address: 
smtp2go Username For Alerts: 
smtp2go Password For Alerts: 
Connecting to Router
Connected to Router Successfully
Web Access Username: 
Web Access Password: 
My Local IP address: 192.168.100.129
My External IP Address: 204.112.198.62
Connected to Network -------------------35763

I took the shield off, checked all the pins, and reinstalled it.  Same issue.  Anything else I can try?

[Rob F]

Hi Warren, well that's definitely the problem, I'll send another w5100 to you, it should arrive in a week or so.

[lumpylipton]

Hi Warren, well that's definitely the problem, I'll send another w5100 to you, it should arrive in a week or so.

Great, thanks Rob.  I'm happy to send the other one back to you if you want it, just let me know.

[Rob F]

No problem, the shipping will probably cost more than its worth so you can do whatever with it. I'll send you a PM with the tracking number.

[lumpylipton]

No problem, the shipping will probably cost more than its worth so you can do whatever with it. I'll send you a PM with the tracking number.

Hi Rob, received the new board today (pretty fast!!) and installed it.  While it now boots up and finds the SD card and files on it, something else odd is now happening.  When the controller boots, everything looks good until it's trying to connect to the network.  At that point, the screen goes dark and will never come back on.  It's like the controller gets locked up.  I've left it for 10 minutes and it never wakes up.  When I unplug the network cable and reboot it, it works fine (other than obviously the network doesn't work).  I was actually noticing this same behaviour with the other board too, but I thought it was related to the fact it couldn't see the card so I didn't think to mention it.  Now in the IDE serial monitor, I can see it booting, finding all the username/password stuff on the SD card, even getting to the point of getting a 192.xxx.xxx.xxx local address from my router, but then nothing, it locks up, I can't bring up the display, and I can't login via the webpage, it doesn't find the controller.

Any ideas?
BTW, I'm on v4.10, it came that way, so you must of upgraded it before you shipped it to me (in a previous message you sent me the password for 4.10, but I'm already there).
Thanks,
Warren

[Rob F]

Hi Warren, I'm so sorry, off hand I'm not sure what could be happening, I think you'll have to send it back to me so I can go over it and see whats going on. I'll private message you some details.

[lumpylipton]

No problem Rob. Whenever you get back from your trip send me a message. Everything works great except the networking. Sometimes it actually doesn't lock up, but it still acts wonky. For example, it shows my username and password truncating a few letters on the screen, but trying to login to the webpage it doesn't accept the username and password. I can see they are correct with the IDE serial monitor. Then eventually it locks up again. So bizarre. For now I've unplugged the network cable, rebooted it and it does everything else just fine.
I'm happy to test anything else if you think of something in the meantime.
Warren

[Rob F]

Thanks for understanding Warren, it does sound odd, I don't think its in the code, sounds hardware related but not sure what. I'll be in touch soon.

[lumpylipton]

Thanks for understanding Warren, it does sound odd, I don't think its in the code, sounds hardware related but not sure what. I'll be in touch soon.

No problem Rob, I'm loving the system, I know we'll get the network thing figured out.  So I came to the realization that while I'm on 4.10, that there is actually a newer version of 4.10 which fixes a couple of bugs.  The reason I noticed was I encountered the ATO bug, where it works perfectly in test mode, but never actually turns on when you set it check every hour.  So, I reprogrammed both the controller and display using the instructions.  Both compiled, uploaded and verified successfully.  However, in the programming manual it says it will show on the display that a new version is available after upload, but I never got that.  And the ATO bug still exists, so I'm thinking I missed some last step and it's still running the older version.   What did I miss?

[Rob F]

Hi Warren, happy to hear you're enjoying it and yeah we'll get that network issue solved. It sounds like you did good on the update, there was no notice on the display because I didn't change the version number. That issue with the ATO wasn't resolved that's why you still experience that, I'm not sure what I missed. As I'm away I don't have the controller to test, I was going to make more blind changes but my laptop is acting up a bit so I'll have to do it when I get back which will be soon. So yeah, its not you its me.