HM Problems

I got my HM assembled today.

When I plug it in using the Pi microUSB, I just get a blinking cursor on the LCD. If I hit some buttons, mostly at random, I can get either the yellow or green LEDs to turn on, and sometimes, I can get gibberish on the screen. For example, at the moment, it is scrolling /////IH/IH////IH, sometimes it adds zeroes and question marks. I'm hoping to see "No Pit Probe", but I've got nothing.

I preconfigured the wifi, but I'm not seeing the device listed on my router.

Any ideas what I could be doing wrong?

Thanks....

You have to power from the main board. 12V in.

You should be able to just power it with the 5V input into the Pi. It is hard to say if the Pi has flashed the microcontroller though, which might mean the whole thing could be acting randomly (because it isn't running any software yet).

I would start by plugging in just the Pi by itself with an HDMI plugged into a TV or monitor, and a USB keyboard. Wait for it to finish booting (usually the last line on the terminal is wlan0: link becomes ready). Press enter on the keyboard and type "ifconfig". It will show the IP address for the device there. If it is 192.168.200.1 then it is in AP mode for some reason. You can switch it over by typing "wifi-client yournetworkname yourpassword" and rebooting. If you don't have a keyboard / HDMI, you can see if it is applying your network config by looking on the sd card (from a computer) and seeing if the wifi lines are commented out (begin with a #). They are commented out after they are applied to the device.

Once you've got it on wifi, get into the webui and go to LinkMeter -> AVR Firmware. Select "bundled firmware" and flash it. If it flashes successfully then you've just got a soldering problem somewhere between the microcontroller and LCD. Check for continuity along the traces (with the power off) and then you can check the voltage levels.