Well spotted Mr MadeAThing! and Chris! I can't believe I missed that! But I've looked into it and the working Wi-Fi board also has those pads bridged. And they appear to be no-connects anyhow. So, sadly it's not that. 😣
@@chrisj2848 so was I ... to the point of leaving like 4 comments trying to get him to see them before he published the video .....lmao well, I see that Steve addressed it... such a shame.... I'm at a total loss now... if it was something expensive and NEEDED to be repaired I'm not sure what I would look into next....
I honestly thought at 9:23 you were going to fling the faulty board across the room and call it a day. But I loved the deep dive into it. Great effort Steve. Love it. 👍
Hey. Justin from Pennsylvania… USA here. I’m a master technician in my industry. I have been binge watching you. Your dry sense of humor and delivery are awesome. I really love your content. There’s another Englishman I enjoy who does watch repair called Gentleman’s watch services. He is hilarious. I do hobby watch repair and am decent at electronics repair. Keep the content coming. It’s really good!
I always admire your tenacity in finding out what went wrong. I would've considered the board swap the repair and be done with it. Can't wait to see your next adventure. 😊
I can only guess how frustrating this one was because I was getting frustrated with the damn board just watching you try to fix it. I have to commend you, I would have taken a hammer to the damn thing.
It's always a great reminder of just how fiddly these things are when you see the "not under the microscope" view. I'd have lost sooooo many components, and tempers over the years doing this. Top man!
Hi Steve, your stuff appeared on my YT suggestions recently and I'm still here. I used to watch Lois Rossmann do similar fixes to Apple computers and even though I don't use Apple I was intrigued by the process. These days he's gone a different direction and suddenly you're feeding that geeky inquisitive part of my mind. Thanks.
Hats off for trying again. I have been watching a lot of "Buy it fix it" channel and he ends up with quite a lot of similar items not working due to corrupted firmware requiring a chip reader, reverse engineering, re-programming... basically nightmare. This might be the same - there may not be a hardware problem at all. Would have loved to know if those pink things were capacitors though. Vishay do make pink ones when you search.
I really enjoy watching your videos, you got a good sense of humor.. I love it. In case you didn't know: How do I reset my Bowers Zeppelin? The Zeppelin has a reset button located at the rear of the product. To return your Zeppelin to its default settings press and hold the reset button for 5 seconds. You will hear an audio cue and notice the LED turn red once you have reached 5 seconds. When the reset procedure is complete the Zeppelin will restart.
The Winbond chip is holding the wifi firmware like a bios chip. The firmware might be corrupted. You may be able to copy the firmware of the good chip and flash it into the faulty one..
Windbond chip is SDRAM chip, I suspect that the SMSC MPU/SOC has in internal NAND/NOR can't find any Reference PDF for it just obsolete notes. But I also suspect it's a firmware problem. Update/Upgrade went wrong. and now it's not booting properly. The smaller SMSC is a Ethernet PHY also no software. just converting RMII from the MPU to Ethernet Signals (Ethernet is differently encoded and voltages, it decouples the MPU from this)
14:50... I was so devastated for you! I thought you now got two dead boards! 🤣 Luckily the replacement still worked despite the capacitor breaking off.
I love that you continue to troubleshoot and investigate even if you have a way to 'solve' it right there. You could have one board fully fixed... or TWO! Also, all the swapping of parts has probably really helped you learn and continue to grow your skills that way so don't think of any of it as wasted time! (Sorry still getting through your video backlog, will be caught up soon!)
I was also about to shout expletives at the screen about the 09:57 bridge blob... but then I remembered this was a sent in speaker and I can't imagine that blob just happened by itself...(unless someone tried a prior repair) - so I guess those specific pads are either ground or just unused. My bet is on the QFN IC chip, which you could probably swap out fairly easily. It's the only chip, along with the amplifier that would be complex enough to cause problems.
Thanks Kaltern! That's a good shout. Although, I think I may have actually changed it. I'm pretty sure I changed everything aside from the BGA chip. I couldn't put it all in the video as I was working on it for hours and hours on end 🤣
@@StezStixFix I wrote about this too..... this wasn't your doing... it's two spots that you didn't fiddle with, on the wifi board... looks like it came like that..... It doesn't have to do with the chips you swapped at all.... you REALLY need to look at the video and see what we're talking about
On the bluetooth board try to change the crystal, if no pulsation the chip near will not work, if you got a good oscilloscope you can check if the you see the frequency of the crystal
If you want to stream audio to an AirPlay device from a PC, you can install a utility called TuneBlade which will act as a bridge. I've used it for testing a B&W speaker.
In my case (on Zeppelin Air, but essentially the same) the BGA blade of the CPU was to blame. Resoldered and everything worked. try putting the board in the freezer for 10 minutes and turning it on, if it works then most likely you need to resolder the CPU. Be careful, the quality of the board is not high, damage the pad is likely.
What about tracing the LED module back to the pins for the Bluetooth sub-board to see where it all connects. Than follow those pins/lands to the components to see what is going on. You have a good one and a defective one. So start following the traces when you see what connection pins are involved...
It goes to the microcontroller under the wifi module on the mainboard. The wifi module might have corrupted linux os hence it fails to communicate with the main board mcu and the mainboard mcu waits for the wifi module to talk to it
It could also be the firmware. As i said in previous comments. The wifi module runs linux and a few applications and daemons that allow it to talk to/with the main mcu on the board. Usually when the speaker is powered on the main mcu on the mainboard waits for the "i am running/i am alive" signal from the wifi module and if the firnware is corrupted the application thats sending that signal might not work/be there. And then the main mcu waits indefinitly for the signal of the wifi module. But sadly i dont think the firmware is available for download so no dice repairing will be impossible. I find it kind of cool but also kind of antirepair friendly to have a full linux computer in a speaker. I know it has to handle the airplay and dhcp and other protocols and the streaming but its kinda annoying and the firmware is also not available for download
I know it's a long shot but you could try reflow the bga chip? blast some heat on it at really low air flow and give it a little tap with tweezers. a bit of a pain now since your light use to diag is put back together haha
Something you sometimes do which i didn't see this time was to use the thermal camera to find any hot spots on the board. I know that has helped in the past, but I'm just clutching at straws.
Cases like these is when you wish that Right-to-Repair and the public availability of schematics & firmware images was a thing. Very likely the firmware on that Wifi module got corrupted, which is why the boot-up sequence of the main board times out and it does the sad red blink.
The thing i hate about these products. I like that they run linux based firmware but it takes one bad update and its hosed and often no firmware is available or the flash tools are oem. Also the fact linux is meant as opensource and the manufacturer does not release the firmware which is 99% of the time linux based because its complex and linux has tons of airplay modules and then it aint even opensource or available :(
At a guess, the pink component is (was) likely to have been an inductor and this connects between pins 12 Vcc2 and 14 vccb (both power) of the 2.4GHz power amp IC. No inductor no worky. From what I see (only in my opinion) the issue with the original speaker was a missing / corrupt configuration which may have been remedied with a factory reset, But, yes, without the configuration utility connected over Ethernet, the only input which will work is the auxiliary jack.
Hi StezStix Fix. Not sure if it is supposed to be there but there is a bridge across the 2nd and 3rd solder strips at 9:54 in the video? Hope this helps.
I don't think I've ever seen an aluminium polymer cap go bad on its own. I would've probably put some polymer back in, there's no way digikey or mouser don't carry something that would work.
Im guessing the WiFI board is also the main controller board for the whole thing seeing as it has a SOC on it as well so it could be a firmware issue or config got corrupt and made it unhappy?
When you first looks at the wifi board there was 2 solder points connected shorting them out, you never looked at that again, I believe it was on the other side of the board?
Seeing how crappy the soldier job is on alot of those factory joints i would check the pin headers on the wifi board interface it might have a bad connection on a critical pin.
Excellent video as always Steve 👍🏼 Question: I see you are up to 78 days without melting anything (congratulations 🎉), what happens when/"if" you get to 100 days? You'll need a 3 digit counter 😅
Hi Steve, Do you know anything about Battery drill charger's. We think it's stuffed, Not charging the battery's. I've had the charger apart, But I no nothing about the board working's. I can see nothing burnt out or chips damaged. Any thought's would help us out. ( For Shedoxford )
I mean can it be that one of the legs (raspberry GPIO like legs) is maybe broken or lose connection in the pcp of the wifi board? Between the layers? Hmm 🤔 stupid wifi thingy
Maybe it is a firmware problem, some of these things use a small flash memory to store the configuration and sometimes also contain the boot loader itself, if a write error occurs it is possible that the memory is corrupted and will not boot.
Litteraly everyone in the comments thinks so and i (an experienced repair hobbyist) also thinks its the firmware. Often these wifi modules run a RTOS or linux based os and it takes one bad update and its hosed
Yes. The wifi module is needed to enable the aux. The mcu on the mainboard communicates to the wifi module. And the wifi module gives the signal to the mainboard microcontroller to switch inputs
prety sure its a software issue should try reading the content of the winbond chip and copy it to the faulty one will likely fix the issue it likely got corrupted during a firmware update
It seems as if the speakers wifi module has some sort of corrupted firmware and ended up bricking itself kind of like how those Bose sound docks end up doing.
STEVE! 09:57!!!!!! What's that!!? I mean, it's worth checking to see if the working WiFi board also has a giant solder blob bridging those pads.
I was yelling at the screen too! 😅
Well spotted Mr MadeAThing! and Chris! I can't believe I missed that! But I've looked into it and the working Wi-Fi board also has those pads bridged. And they appear to be no-connects anyhow. So, sadly it's not that. 😣
@@chrisj2848 so was I ... to the point of leaving like 4 comments trying to get him to see them before he published the video .....lmao
well, I see that Steve addressed it... such a shame.... I'm at a total loss now... if it was something expensive and NEEDED to be repaired I'm not sure what I would look into next....
LMAO I was just about to write that !!
@@highroyds me too 😀
I honestly thought at 9:23 you were going to fling the faulty board across the room and call it a day. But I loved the deep dive into it. Great effort Steve. Love it. 👍
I was VERY close! 🤣
Hey. Justin from Pennsylvania… USA here. I’m a master technician in my industry. I have been binge watching you. Your dry sense of humor and delivery are awesome. I really love your content. There’s another Englishman I enjoy who does watch repair called Gentleman’s watch services. He is hilarious. I do hobby watch repair and am decent at electronics repair. Keep the content coming. It’s really good!
Philly representing! Well, Bucks County now. But still close to Philly.
@@vadimbellous8313 York Co.
I always admire your tenacity in finding out what went wrong. I would've considered the board swap the repair and be done with it. Can't wait to see your next adventure. 😊
I can only guess how frustrating this one was because I was getting frustrated with the damn board just watching you try to fix it. I have to commend you, I would have taken a hammer to the damn thing.
🤣 I'd be lying if i said that didn't cross my mind several times!! 😂
It's always a great reminder of just how fiddly these things are when you see the "not under the microscope" view. I'd have lost sooooo many components, and tempers over the years doing this.
Top man!
I find myself looking for your uploads daily. I can't believe the amount of patience you have.
Maybe it has something to do with the solder bridge on the WiFi board at 9:56
I love your style where we actually get to watch you learn things in real time, it's cool!
Hi Steve, your stuff appeared on my YT suggestions recently and I'm still here. I used to watch Lois Rossmann do similar fixes to Apple computers and even though I don't use Apple I was intrigued by the process. These days he's gone a different direction and suddenly you're feeding that geeky inquisitive part of my mind. Thanks.
Hats off for trying again. I have been watching a lot of "Buy it fix it" channel and he ends up with quite a lot of similar items not working due to corrupted firmware requiring a chip reader, reverse engineering, re-programming... basically nightmare. This might be the same - there may not be a hardware problem at all. Would have loved to know if those pink things were capacitors though. Vishay do make pink ones when you search.
I really enjoy watching your videos, you got a good sense of humor.. I love it. In case you didn't know:
How do I reset my Bowers Zeppelin?
The Zeppelin has a reset button located at the rear of the product. To return your Zeppelin to its default settings press and hold the reset button for 5 seconds. You will hear an audio cue and notice the LED turn red once you have reached 5 seconds. When the reset procedure is complete the Zeppelin will restart.
The Winbond chip is holding the wifi firmware like a bios chip.
The firmware might be corrupted.
You may be able to copy the firmware of the good chip and flash it into the faulty one..
Windbond chip is SDRAM chip, I suspect that the SMSC MPU/SOC has in internal NAND/NOR can't find any Reference PDF for it just obsolete notes.
But I also suspect it's a firmware problem. Update/Upgrade went wrong. and now it's not booting properly. The smaller SMSC is a Ethernet PHY also no software. just converting RMII from the MPU to Ethernet Signals (Ethernet is differently encoded and voltages, it decouples the MPU from this)
That last line before the outro had so much wisdom in it!
14:50... I was so devastated for you! I thought you now got two dead boards! 🤣 Luckily the replacement still worked despite the capacitor breaking off.
I love that you continue to troubleshoot and investigate even if you have a way to 'solve' it right there. You could have one board fully fixed... or TWO! Also, all the swapping of parts has probably really helped you learn and continue to grow your skills that way so don't think of any of it as wasted time! (Sorry still getting through your video backlog, will be caught up soon!)
I was also about to shout expletives at the screen about the 09:57 bridge blob... but then I remembered this was a sent in speaker and I can't imagine that blob just happened by itself...(unless someone tried a prior repair) - so I guess those specific pads are either ground or just unused. My bet is on the QFN IC chip, which you could probably swap out fairly easily. It's the only chip, along with the amplifier that would be complex enough to cause problems.
Thanks Kaltern! That's a good shout. Although, I think I may have actually changed it. I'm pretty sure I changed everything aside from the BGA chip. I couldn't put it all in the video as I was working on it for hours and hours on end 🤣
@@StezStixFix I wrote about this too..... this wasn't your doing... it's two spots that you didn't fiddle with, on the wifi board... looks like it came like that..... It doesn't have to do with the chips you swapped at all.... you REALLY need to look at the video and see what we're talking about
At 9:54, as you’re skimming across the pin connections, you can see two of them on (2nd and 3rd on the far right), lower line, are soldered together.
I came here to say that
They are no-connects, same on both good and bad wifi boards
Reset clock - 'melted plastic'!! Base of C29 capacitor from using heat 🙂 Ditto - 2 solder bridges - 1 massive and 1 small.
It was a fix really. Well done. I have a Nintendo game and watch climber with no sound if you want to try fixing it?
That was a brain scratcher! The mixing of parts or keeping them un-mixed up was quite the situation!
You should look for a JTAG connector as it may be a firmware issue. Thanks for the video!
Hi, Steve. The pulsing light means it needs a reset. Hold ithe reset button in for 10 seconds.
What an emotional rollercoaster. I envy your perserverance!
Yay more stoof! I was inspired to fix my automatic bin because of your videos and it actually works now.
On the bluetooth board try to change the crystal, if no pulsation the chip near will not work, if you got a good oscilloscope you can check if the you see the frequency of the crystal
Oscilloscope is something he really needs.
Simply probing for noise on the caps would have saved alot of time (de-) soldering those caps.
@@samuraidriver4x4 I agreed with that ^^ , only problem is just to know how to ajust it hehehe
You can get parts to match from RS, DigiKey, CPC Farnell, youll get plenty of parts there, even ports and connectors
2:10 is my friend. I'm a poet and I don't know it. Thank you for the video.
I love your humble honesty.
So frustrating until the end when we got a nice taste of the Steve Girls 😂
@2:00 long solder blob went under what looks like a 555 timer next to the 220 coil
If you want to stream audio to an AirPlay device from a PC, you can install a utility called TuneBlade which will act as a bridge. I've used it for testing a B&W speaker.
In my case (on Zeppelin Air, but essentially the same) the BGA blade of the CPU was to blame. Resoldered and everything worked. try putting the board in the freezer for 10 minutes and turning it on, if it works then most likely you need to resolder the CPU. Be careful, the quality of the board is not high, damage the pad is likely.
What about tracing the LED module back to the pins for the Bluetooth sub-board to see where it all connects. Than follow those pins/lands to the components to see what is going on. You have a good one and a defective one. So start following the traces when you see what connection pins are involved...
It goes to the microcontroller under the wifi module on the mainboard. The wifi module might have corrupted linux os hence it fails to communicate with the main board mcu and the mainboard mcu waits for the wifi module to talk to it
It could also be the firmware. As i said in previous comments. The wifi module runs linux and a few applications and daemons that allow it to talk to/with the main mcu on the board. Usually when the speaker is powered on the main mcu on the mainboard waits for the "i am running/i am alive" signal from the wifi module and if the firnware is corrupted the application thats sending that signal might not work/be there. And then the main mcu waits indefinitly for the signal of the wifi module. But sadly i dont think the firmware is available for download so no dice repairing will be impossible. I find it kind of cool but also kind of antirepair friendly to have a full linux computer in a speaker. I know it has to handle the airplay and dhcp and other protocols and the streaming but its kinda annoying and the firmware is also not available for download
Just dump the nand and flash it over, if possible. (But take backups of the original, and always read more than once, then Checksum them.)
This is my thought as well, I would look for a serial console pinout on the board and see if you can get any info as to why its not booting
Take a second look at this one Steve
Damn, that direct heat on the capacitor was something (1:30)
I know it's a long shot but you could try reflow the bga chip? blast some heat on it at really low air flow and give it a little tap with tweezers.
a bit of a pain now since your light use to diag is put back together haha
I'm a new fan of the channel. This one was PAINFUL, ouch. Fairly educational though, even though it's still a mystery
You sort of semi know what you are doing, you are funny lad, I enjoy watching your videos, keep em coming
Something you sometimes do which i didn't see this time was to use the thermal camera to find any hot spots on the board. I know that has helped in the past, but I'm just clutching at straws.
Cases like these is when you wish that Right-to-Repair and the public availability of schematics & firmware images was a thing. Very likely the firmware on that Wifi module got corrupted, which is why the boot-up sequence of the main board times out and it does the sad red blink.
The thing i hate about these products. I like that they run linux based firmware but it takes one bad update and its hosed and often no firmware is available or the flash tools are oem. Also the fact linux is meant as opensource and the manufacturer does not release the firmware which is 99% of the time linux based because its complex and linux has tons of airplay modules and then it aint even opensource or available :(
In the 9.54 minute the broken wifi board have a part whit a solder joint togheter. Make diference?
If anything, it's still good practice.
I like your videos. Big fan from Algeria 🇩🇿 ❤
Did you try a thermal camera ? Maybe something on the faulty wifi board is showing
This is a good idea, inject voltage and view board from both sides, keep upping the voltage until something glows, or something pops :D
@ 18:14 - bluetooth pairing. Bad BT chip?
I love the way you tested the faulty board while it was still covered in tin foil. No short circuit chance there, then.
5:30 wasn't there molten plastic on the base of the capacitor?
I saw 2 pins shorted together with solder in the video maybe that's the reason have another look
At a guess, the pink component is (was) likely to have been an inductor and this connects between pins 12 Vcc2 and 14 vccb (both power) of the 2.4GHz power amp IC. No inductor no worky. From what I see (only in my opinion) the issue with the original speaker was a missing / corrupt configuration which may have been remedied with a factory reset, But, yes, without the configuration utility connected over Ethernet, the only input which will work is the auxiliary jack.
Suggested reset / configuration in original video.....
Does sticking an iPhone on the top port work? I don't know if that would help diagnose the fault or anything, but I'm curious anyway
5:04 .. melted plastic ... reset the counter :)
9:54 bridge on right second and third pad from lower row
9:53 in video, observe short between two of the many pins.
I should have seen it has been commented before.
I would check the trace on each pin, since it is behaving like it would if it's not connected.
Hi StezStix Fix. Not sure if it is supposed to be there but there is a bridge across the 2nd and 3rd solder strips at 9:54 in the video? Hope this helps.
I don't think I've ever seen an aluminium polymer cap go bad on its own. I would've probably put some polymer back in, there's no way digikey or mouser don't carry something that would work.
love my appley things ...just work
Im guessing the WiFI board is also the main controller board for the whole thing seeing as it has a SOC on it as well so it could be a firmware issue or config got corrupt and made it unhappy?
It feels like a software issue on the wireless card. Can you update the firmware and factory reset on the Z2 to rule that out? Solid.
I was seriously saying bad power supply but now you've proven me wrong
When you first looks at the wifi board there was 2 solder points connected shorting them out, you never looked at that again, I believe it was on the other side of the board?
Seeing how crappy the soldier job is on alot of those factory joints i would check the pin headers on the wifi board interface it might have a bad connection on a critical pin.
the pateron songs work better if you 1.15x them. actually has a beat. Well it is a fix however basically it ended up being just buy a new board.
Great re-visit… How frustrating it must be not being able to get to the bottom of the fault on that wifi board… Stupid WiFi…👍🏻
Difficult thing is they run firmware which is linux based and quite complex and it takes one bad update and its hosed
I seen a bridge on one of the chips
What you think of a esr tester
Excellent video as always Steve 👍🏼
Question: I see you are up to 78 days without melting anything (congratulations 🎉), what happens when/"if" you get to 100 days? You'll need a 3 digit counter 😅
Isn't it a bad idea to solder/desolder electrolytic capacitors with hot air?
Hi Stez. What hardware are you using to zoom in on boards/components?
Hi Steve, Do you know anything about Battery drill charger's. We think it's stuffed, Not charging the battery's. I've had the charger apart, But I no nothing about the board working's. I can see nothing burnt out or chips damaged. Any thought's would help us out. ( For Shedoxford )
I live in the UK. Near Oxford.
i've seen some videos where they upgrade firmware
Nice fix Steve I would of thrown it out lol, patience pays off every time 😊
those smd caps are easily removed by grabbing them with pliers and twisting them off the board.
Steve- on the faulty one..... did you try the 3mm jack with the flashing red ? I bet it would have worked
10/10 for perseverance
You must search for polymer caps,it has better specs.
I mean can it be that one of the legs (raspberry GPIO like legs) is maybe broken or lose connection in the pcp of the wifi board? Between the layers? Hmm 🤔 stupid wifi thingy
C23 joint on main board doesn't look great as didn't the short on WiFi board at 9:54
5:31 That capacitor it totally melted at the bottom 🙄
6:34 You leave the aluminum foil on when you turn it on? That can short circuit the board.
Maybe it is a firmware problem, some of these things use a small flash memory to store the configuration and sometimes also contain the boot loader itself, if a write error occurs it is possible that the memory is corrupted and will not boot.
Litteraly everyone in the comments thinks so and i (an experienced repair hobbyist) also thinks its the firmware. Often these wifi modules run a RTOS or linux based os and it takes one bad update and its hosed
you have a great attitude thirst for knowledge
Hi! Its a corupted firmware of WI-FI board that wont allow to boot main board.....
Saw the solder bridge as soon as he first starting working on the board....
Can anybody explain what is that liquid that is like glue but then become water and how to use it
does it need wifi if you're on;y going to use the Aux port?
Yeah, it won't even turn on until you've gone through the whole setup process and connected it to Wi-Fi... a very strange design choice! 😲
Yes. The wifi module is needed to enable the aux. The mcu on the mainboard communicates to the wifi module. And the wifi module gives the signal to the mainboard microcontroller to switch inputs
prety sure its a software issue should try reading the content of the winbond chip and copy it to the faulty one will likely fix the issue it likely got corrupted during a firmware update
That was a good try Steve, keep doing these videos , there great 👍
It's been 6 weeks since Mario Track Gate.... Still no word...
It seems as if the speakers wifi module has some sort of corrupted firmware and ended up bricking itself kind of like how those Bose sound docks end up doing.
Steve, what is the actually meaning of the Gordon the Gopher?
@9:54 I saw a solder bridge!
Hey Steve. Can you share the link of the board on eBay?
What is iChunes?
Reflowing that BGA chip is probably worth a try
I 100% think its firmware
Had to pause straight away, at 9:57 it looks like there's a solder bridge.
Why just not buy one ? Ore test ?
I suspected the WiFi board the whole time. The 30sec looks like some initialization, that fails or gives up after 30sec.
Its 100% the linux os on the wifi module corrupted and that prevents it from talking to the mainboard muc or to boot up
epic fight - great one !
thanks
So did anyone find out what the pink things ng was that broke on the good wifi board?