HC2 will not boot af power failure

[severin 10]

My HC2 will not boot af power failure.

When the power comes back the blue leds starts flashing but the process stops when all 8 LEDs are turned on.

I have checked the bios in the HC2 is set to Power on "After power failure".
The Warm Boot function (pressing the on / off switch on the rear panel) restart the HC2 and provided access to the BIOS.
But the Cold Boot function (the power supply is dis- and reconnected) do not work. Only 2 times out of 10 attempts I was able to connect the BIOS settings at a Cold Boot.
I also have tried to change Power on setting to "last statement" but it did not help. Then the BIOS was set back to Power on "After power failure".
Since there has only been one power cut since I bought the HC2 center januar 2016, it must be open to question whether it is a manufacturing defect?
Fibaro informs in a service video: "After this (setting the BIOS to: Power on "After power failure) Center should start correctly. Otherwise, it is damaged and you should return it to service".
Is there someone who knows if there are more repair opportunities or whether the device should be returned to service / repair?
 

 

Edited December 2, 2016 by severin

[stastasinek 3]

I have the same problem.. noticed it after I switched of the main house power and after switching it back on my FIBARO HC2 did not reboot to a working state... And again a few days ago I had a spike in the power supply which caused the FIBARO HC2 to restart and again did NOT boot up..

So yesterday after reading forums I tried to see what was happening after switch power off then back ON.. I noticed that it goes through the process of booting up but when it gets to the stage when the three lights supposed to come on one by one, it goes blank... I left it for half an hour and saw that every few minutes it tried to switch on but on every attempt stopped with no LED lights on.. this happened about 6 times in that half hour...

The only way I managed to switch it on fully with the 3 LED's on was to press and hold the power button at the back of the fibaro unit for 3 seconds, let go then briefly press it again and it powered on fully...

I have noticed that many individuals think that the unit is at fault, and FIBARO are asking individuals to send units to them... This is wrong and FIBARO should have rectified this, as this all started to happen after there recent FIRMWARE updates, coincidence, maybe but seem unusual that so many people are suffering with same problem after the recent updates. ...

Its no big deal but again unacceptable that it is happening, as I can not remotely reboot my FIBARO if trouble happens where it has frozen while away,  and it has but have managed to reboot it with a remote wifi plug... again if i have a power failure while away and it returns my fibaro will not now... SO FIBARO SORT IT OUT..TELL US WHAT IS HAPPENING..

Edited January 28, 2019 by stastasinek

[Peter Eggestig 0]

On 1/28/2019 at 5:36 PM, stastasinek said:

I have the same problem.. noticed it after I switched of the main house power and after switching it back on my FIBARO HC2 did not reboot to a working state... And again a few days ago I had a spike in the power supply which caused the FIBARO HC2 to restart and again did NOT boot up..

So yesterday after reading forums I tried to see what was happening after switch power off then back ON.. I noticed that it goes through the process of booting up but when it gets to the stage when the three lights supposed to come on one by one, it goes blank... I left it for half an hour and saw that every few minutes it tried to switch on but on every attempt stopped with no LED lights on.. this happened about 6 times in that half hour...

The only way I managed to switch it on fully with the 3 LED's on was to press and hold the power button at the back of the fibaro unit for 3 seconds, let go then briefly press it again and it powered on fully...

I have noticed that many individuals think that the unit is at fault, and FIBARO are asking individuals to send units to them... This is wrong and FIBARO should have rectified this, as this all started to happen after there recent FIRMWARE updates, coincidence, maybe but seem unusual that so many people are suffering with same problem after the recent updates. ...

Its no big deal but again unacceptable that it is happening, as I can not remotely reboot my FIBARO if trouble happens where it has frozen while away,  and it has but have managed to reboot it with a remote wifi plug... again if i have a power failure while away and it returns my fibaro will not now... SO FIBARO SORT IT OUT..TELL US WHAT IS HAPPENING..

I have the same problem, and need an answer. This is really enoying. //Peter

Edited January 29, 2019 by Peter Eggestig

[D-Vine 64]

On 4/14/2018 at 10:54 PM, amoebe said:

I had exact the same symptoms as Marbe described, and I've solved it. I saw on this forum a hint about the CMos battery, so I checked the voltage.

It was 2,8 Volts, and the CR2032 should have 3 Volts, so I assumed that it was "empty". I replaced it with a new one, measured voltage 3,3 Volts.

Bios settings were not affected when I replaced the battery. Now the HC2 boots when I remove the power and plug it in again. I had this issue for months, and now I'm a happy person. I live in an area where we have several power outages for hours and that happens a few times per year, and my UPS will not hold that long. I hope, by sharing this, that many of you can solve this now finally. 

 

I have the same problem.

Got a question, do I need to soldering something with the battery or is it just replace of it into the plastic sealing?

 

 

[Olex 0]

I have also seen this problem before.
And also today!
There has been a power loss in my home area for a few hours yesterday.
When the power come back, the HC2 did not start properly, all others unit on the networks responds remotely.
I’m not home at the moment, therefore it’s a bad feeling to know that you CAN’T connect to your “smart home” after a power loss!
This is obvious a problem that had to be addressed in a firmware update asap.
As for now, I must wait until I come home and manually switch off/on the HC2 again.

 

Edit: when I log in to my home network system, I can see that the HC2 has beed given an IP from the DHCP server.
It is part of the home network, but it is not possible to access it remotely. 

 

Edit 2:

When I come home yesterday, I tried again to remotely access the HC2, no luck.
All LED’s was normal.
Switched it off, waited 15 seconds and switched it on again.
After the reboot, I could access the HC2 remotely.

There is obviously a problem with the Fibaro home center after an power loss.
I have read about other customers that use an secondary wi-fi remote switch that manually switch off/on the power to the home center in case of problem.
There should be no need for any emergency system like this, Fibaro need to fix the software so that the unit works after an power loss.

 Otherwise, you can’t thrust the system, especially used as an security system.

 

 

Thanks and regards,
Olex

Edited April 26, 2019 by Olex
Added information

[amoebe 5]

Hi D-Vine,

 

The battery is like this: 

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sorry for the russian link, but it was the first that i found with google that gave the best pictures. You can buy these on many webshops in your local country for a few bucks. but if you are familiar with electronics you can open the old heatshrink and remove the spotwelded small plates from the old battery and add them on a new CR2032 battery with some insulation tape and new heatshrink  

 

 

Hi Olex,

 

Please read my different postings here on this forum , I struggled with the exact same same problem, and replacing the C-mos battery fixed my issue. 

Edited May 1, 2019 by amoebe

[didira 0]

I'm having this problem too. all LEDs light except service which blinks. I already changed the motherboard battery and nothing. Does anyone else have a solution?

[Guest MarcelK]

#MeToo

[Guest minimax]

Had the same problem. If your fibaro is years old, it is mostlikely the battery. Open the box carefully, take out the battery with connector, take it to the nearrest electronic parts shop and buy a replacement. Mine was like €3. Good luck

[kelvincoffey 4]

I contacted support and got the typical run around and no solution.

 

++1 for the CMOS battery.  Pulled it out (we cant get the RTC battery in AU, they are AUD$45!!!).

 

I cut open the existing heat shrink, cut the wires, soldered them onto a new battery from the local store, taped it up and all working!

 

Wouldn't have thought of the CMOS battery.     I also verified this as the BIOS has a error log that showed battery failure as well.

 

Thanks to the forum for the support.

[Barend76 1]

It would be nice if Fibaro could put this bios log into the diagnostics screen. Or indicate that the battery is dead and need to be replaced.

[Stealth 9]

Same symptoms/problem here and it was the CMOS battery.  I purchase a new one with the lead and plug already attached from eBay type is a CR2032 BC13 for £2.60 (photos attached)

 

Straightforward to replace it just need some double sided tape to stick the battery back on top the IC chip where it normally lives.

 

Once the battery is installed you need to then boot into recovery mode, then exit that menu without doing the recovery. The BIOS then recognises the new battery and should reboot without the error.

 

However it took me a few attempts to get into recovery mode and just showed the same error so don't give up!

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[Stealth 9]

23 hours ago, petergebruers said:

@Stealth is that a recent photo of your HC2? In that case you may want to remove that "recovery dongle" because fw > 4.500 does not use that stick and it can cause issues...

Yes it is a recent photo, I didn’t hear about removing the dongle. Would of been nice if Fibaro sent a notification/message to advise after  firmware version ***** remove dongle.

 

Thanks for letting me know.

 

Steve

[SDeath 63]

I had the same issue, these instuctions saved my HC2:

 

[Richard75 0]

On 4/14/2018 at 10:54 PM, amoebe said:

I had exact the same symptoms as Marbe described, and I've solved it. I saw on this forum a hint about the CMos battery, so I checked the voltage.

It was 2,8 Volts, and the CR2032 should have 3 Volts, so I assumed that it was "empty". I replaced it with a new one, measured voltage 3,3 Volts.

Bios settings were not affected when I replaced the battery. Now the HC2 boots when I remove the power and plug it in again. I had this issue for months, and now I'm a happy person. I live in an area where we have several power outages for hours and that happens a few times per year, and my UPS will not hold that long. I hope, by sharing this, that many of you can solve this now finally. 

@amoebe Hi, I think I have the same issue. My HC2 restarts with some difficulties; this evening I had to cut the power for some electrical adjustments and I had to do a recovery. Can I simply exchange the battery on the PCB without losing any BIOS settings? EDIT : I think I can; didn't read the other replies carefully. So, lets give it a go.

Edited August 30, 2021 by Richard75

[savilmik 0]

On 9/21/2020 at 10:57 AM, petergebruers said:

@Stealth is that a recent photo of your HC2? In that case you may want to remove that "recovery dongle" because fw > 4.500 does not use that stick and it can cause issues...

Thanks for answers here. My HC2 also died a week ago and I was already going to by new one until I read your fix suggestions. 

 

I removed the Recovery stick and also learnt that this device has HDMI port under the aluminium cover. ?

 

After this the device booted and everything was like before. So big thanks to you all! 

[fingusio 12]

so which battery dont see two types at Amazon....

[Stealth 9]

There are two differently shaped/ sized connectors, don't be misled by the part number - Even if the model matches you need to be certain that the connector is identical to this or it may not fit due to revisions of the same models...

 

 

 

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Or

 

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Edited May 21, 2022 by Stealth

[[email protected] 0]

On 1/28/2019 at 4:36 PM, stastasinek said:

I have the same problem.. noticed it after I switched of the main house power and after switching it back on my FIBARO HC2 did not reboot to a working state... And again a few days ago I had a spike in the power supply which caused the FIBARO HC2 to restart and again did NOT boot up..

So yesterday after reading forums I tried to see what was happening after switch power off then back ON.. I noticed that it goes through the process of booting up but when it gets to the stage when the three lights supposed to come on one by one, it goes blank... I left it for half an hour and saw that every few minutes it tried to switch on but on every attempt stopped with no LED lights on.. this happened about 6 times in that half hour...

The only way I managed to switch it on fully with the 3 LED's on was to press and hold the power button at the back of the fibaro unit for 3 seconds, let go then briefly press it again and it powered on fully...

I have noticed that many individuals think that the unit is at fault, and FIBARO are asking individuals to send units to them... This is wrong and FIBARO should have rectified this, as this all started to happen after there recent FIRMWARE updates, coincidence, maybe but seem unusual that so many people are suffering with same problem after the recent updates. ...

Its no big deal but again unacceptable that it is happening, as I can not remotely reboot my FIBARO if trouble happens where it has frozen while away,  and it has but have managed to reboot it with a remote wifi plug... again if i have a power failure while away and it returns my fibaro will not now... SO FIBARO SORT IT OUT..TELL US WHAT IS HAPPENING..

Thanks came across this in 2023 and the 3 seconds bit worked first time.

[ingen59-2 0]

Same problem on my HC2 (after blinking boot sequence, all is black) and same solution (replace CR2030 battery from 2013).
The CR2032 is a common battery available "everywhere", so you may not need to buy with the wires and connector.
Actually, the connector is small and with age it may become brittle, so maybe it is also safer to avoid pulling out the CR2032 connector.
After having cut open the plastic surrounding the battery, there was enough surplus metal not soldered to the battery, so I could re-use this after having cut off the connecting metal close to the soldering.

Re-soldering is not necessary (in my opinion), I just used some scotch tape: But beware not to short-circuit the two sides of the cr2032 (put some tape around the rim first).

And make sure red goes to the + of the battery.

Finally, put plenty of tape around the battery so it will not get in contact with anything inside the HC2.

Al long as you do not shake the HC2 this should work OK.

Edited September 9, 2023 by ingen59-2

[NickeSvensk 1]

I have had the same problem for a while now with the HC2 not booting after a power failure. I have ordered a couple different batteries but they all came with the wrong contact.

 

Finally I found a battery with the right specifications and contact on Amazon and replaced it.

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The problem for me was that the contact on the old battery was so brittle that I broke when I tried to pull it out as pointed out in other posts.

 

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That was a problem since now I had a contact that was hard to pull out and at the same time it broke into small pieces when I tried to pull it out with a pair of small bent tip snipe nose pliers. 

 

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Luckily I had a dental sickle scaler in my tool box and that was helpful when trying to get pice by pice out of the contact by pulling, scraping and bending inside the contact on the board.

 

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This is the result after some careful scraping and pulling with the dental sickle scaler I had a clean contact. Now I just had to replace the old battery with the new one.

I connected the new battery and placed it on the ethernet contact instead do avoid the heat from the circuit it was originally placed on. 

 

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Now I just had to reboot into recovery mode by first plugging in the power to the HC2 and then turn it off with the power button on the back side by holding it pressed for a few seconds. Then start it again with the power button and immediately pressing and holding the + button next to the power button until the first led was lit up at the front during the boot sequence. 

I waited a few minutes until it had booted in to recovery mode. Logged in via it's usual IP address and then I just exited recovery mode and let the HC2 boot into its normal mode. 

 

Now everything is back online and working fine. 

 

Good luck replacing your battery.

 

 

 

 

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Edited February 13 by NickeSvensk