Ipod mini won't power on from SELECT/On button

[davesmylie]

Hi

I've got an Ipod Mini, 1st generation player, that I've been using rockbox on for about 9 months. It has now stopped responding to the select button when it's powered off - ie, you can't turn it on.  I've tried restarting countless times, and it's not an issue with the buttons being broken, as once the ipod has powered up they all work fine.

Plugging it into the PC via usb cable, or the wall charger will wake it up, and it can boot happily into either rockbox, or the normal apple OS.  However, (and this is the weird part), the select button works fine with both OS's once it's started - you can browse directories, select songs etc and it works as normal.
If i go into sleep mode in the apple OS, it will wake up from sleep with a press of the select button. However, if i reset it and go to rockbox os, and then go into sleep mode, it won't wake up from sleep mode until I either plug it back into the computer or the wall.

I've tried reinstalling the bootware loader, and upgrading to the current version of rockbox - it's had no effect.

Any one got any ideas as to what I can try next?

Cheers
Dave Smylie

[gnu]

Try starting it with the [menu] button rather that with [select]. Or simply restart it with [menu] + [select].

[davesmylie]

No buttons do anything when it's turned off - I can mash away at all the buttons forever with no response (even holding down for 90 seconds or more). Yet as soon as I plug it in, it starts up, and I can boot to either OS, wherein, all the keys + scroll wheel work perfectly.

I've restarted the device countless times, (as would be needed to install the latest bootloader, and the latest version of rockbox, or indeed, even to boot between the OS to test that the buttons work in both - which they do, as soon as the unit is powered up).

Thanks for the suggestion, but not quite what I'm looking for . . . .

Cheers
Dave Smylie

[gnu]

Sounds to me as if you're having a hardware issue - in which case I cannot help you.
What did you do before it stopped responding? (e.g. leaving it in heat, dropping it...)

[Flid]

Why would this be a hardware issue, if the on/select buttons works as soon as the power-on is actually triggered? Very strange.

Dave, have you tried older rockbox versions, dating back to when this didn't happen? Did it start happening after a specific update?

[RotAtoR]

Why would this be a hardware issue, if the on/select buttons works as soon as the power-on is actually triggered? Very strange.

Exactly what software do you think is running when the device is powered off? It has to be a lower level problem than Rockbox since it's not even running at that point.

[DefineByte]

Are you sure it doesn't start up if you hold menu + select for a while (around 30 seconds)?

[Flid]

I was just thinking a quirk in the bootloader preventing anything from loading on keypress. If not, then it must be hardware (~assumes that there is a hardwired connection between < select > and a power-up that's seperate from basic button signalling~). Has anyone done detailed disections of the iPod? Should this be moved to hardware forum?

[davesmylie]

I hadn't done anything recently to the ipod - had upgraded to the current (at the time) version of rockbox about two or three months back.  Was just walking to work when rockbox crashed, and after restarting (as per normal), I was unable to start it.
At first I just assumed it was the battery, but that was quickly/easily ruled out.

I figure it has to be a hardware issue, but it's just plain weird that the buttons work fine once the OS is loaded. All I can think of is that Flid must be correct in assuming there is a seperate connection between < select > and power-on that has broken. Supporting this, I've noticed that if I go into the apple OS, and reboot it (as opposed to putting it to sleep by hold down play), it won't start either. Where as it works fine -  starting on key press from sleep in the apple OS. (So i guess the sleep mode in the apple OS, isn't really a low level sleep like the rockbox one presumably is.

Thanks for your suggestions - should I move this to the hardware forum?

Cheers
Dave Smylie

[Llorean]

Please do not use < and > adjacent to letters. Without putting spaces, they're interpreted as markup.


And yes "Sleep" in the AppleOS is very different from actually powering off the iPod (what we do). It's essentially a low power mode, but still on. If you leave it in that mode long enough (I believe the time is a day or two, but don't know exactly) it will eventually go into what Apple has called "Deep Sleep" which is an actual poweroff, I believe.

[davesmylie]

Thanks for clearing that up for me Llorean.

Sucks that it's physically broken, but at least I know there's no point continuing to play with the config trying to fix it =)

Cheers
Dave Smylie