I think I've heard this reported on the BBS before, but I was never afflicted with the problem until now. I'm wondering if anyone has any reports on what to do about it.

When I first got my Empeg, it was installed in my VW GTI. I never had any trouble with starting the car while the Empeg was playing. The Empeg would briefly go dark/silent as I started the car, then pick right up again where it left off. It did not reboot. It was connected to the radio power lead, which, in that car, was an always-on power connection.

In my new Honda Accord, the voltage drop that happens when I start the car seems to be more severe. The Empeg reboots instead of just briefly going dark. I have tried it both by connecting to the radio always-on power lead, as well as wiring directly to the battery. In both cases, it fully reboots every time I start the car.

But it gets worse: Sometimes, during this reboot, it doesn't fully come back up again. It sits there at the kernel boot screen (the Empeg logo) and never goes past it. I have to pull it out of the dash and put it back in again to make it boot properly. This is intermittent.

Note that this reboot happens whether the unit is playing or if it's in standby mode. When it does this reboot while playing, there's a pretty bad speaker pop associated with it, and the 1k resistors on the outputs don't help. When it does the reboot while in standby mode, I can hear the amps turning on and off again, with a milder pop sound.

I see three separate problems here: One of them is my refusal to connect the Empeg to the ignition-switched wire. I want the Empeg to run when the engine is off and the key is disconnected. Let's just take that one as a given and see if I can solve the other two problems, which are:

- The starting-car voltage drop is beyond the Empeg's threshold for a "go dark, pause, and come back" cycle.

- But the voltage drop so brief that it's somehow confusing the firmware so that its reboot cycle is screwed up. Perhaps it's something with the IDE drives and their spinup time?

My first thought was to get a lightning cap from Crutchfield, but jeez, those are a hundred bucks a pop. Is there a less expensive solution? Anyone?... Anyone?... Bueller?...

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Is there a less expensive solution? Anyone?... Anyone?... Bueller?...

Free solution: Insert the Empeg 3/4 the way into its sled, start the car. Once the car is running complete the Empeg insertion process.

Hardly elegant -- but it should work and wouldn't be a hard habit to get into...

-- Bleys



"If you would judge, understand." -- Seneca

Is there a less expensive solution? Anyone?

I think I would start out with a new car battery....

If the voltage drops below about 8.5v when starting, the Mk1 will reboot as the 3.3v rail goes out of regulation. A diode and a capacitor (which doesn't really have to be a huge thing - without doing the calculations, maybe a couple of 4700uF 25v ones might do it) could help, depending on how long you have to crank your engine for.

The Mk2 is a bit better, as the new PSU will keep the CPU running down to about 5.5v. The Mk1 would reboot when I started my CRX, the Mk2 would blank the display (powerfail) then come back without a reboot every time.

Hugo

Schofiel: It's a brand new car, literally right off the lot. It doesn't need a new battery. That is the normal amount of voltage drop for that make/model of Honda.

Hugo: I crank the engine very briefly, it's a brand new car and starts more easily than any car I've owned. I'm not trained in electronics theory, so I'm unclear on exactly how to purchase and wire such a capacitor/diode system. However, this option sounds very attractive to me as I don't want to shell out the extra cash for a Lightning Cap if I don't need to. Could you give a more detailed description?

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Ok: the simple way is to take the power feed that would be going to the empeg (before it goes through the filter supplied with the empeg), and put a 3A+ diode in the line, with the white band towards the empeg. Next, get some large 25v electrolytic capacitors - 4700uF ones are less than $2 - and connect these between ground and the empeg side of the diode. Try with one, then two, and so on, making sure you put them the right way round (black stripe to negative).

These just help prop the voltage up at the empeg end when the power goes away from the battery feed. The diode stops the charge from the capacitors from trying to recharge the car's battery when the voltage drops :)

Hugo

My first thought was to get a lightning cap from Crutchfield, but jeez, those are a hundred bucks a pop. Is there a less expensive solution? Anyone?... Anyone?... Bueller?...

---

Here's a quick and dirty, but usable solution for you... I've got a battery rigged up which gets its power from a radio shack adapter. As I mentioned elsewhere, the power adapter that I bought from radio shack causes the empeg to reboot on itsown, but it works fine when connected to battery then to the empeg..
The battery that I got was a simple 5 amp, 12volt alarm battery available from radio shack.. it was only 20-30$ or so.. (can't remember); it is a simple sealed lead-acid battery...
-mark
-mark

...proud to have one of the first Mark I units

Schofiel: It's a brand new car, literally right off the lot. It doesn't need a new battery. That is the normal amount of voltage drop for that make/model of Honda.

---

Wait a minute - what year is your honda? I've got a '99 honda accord; and I've often played the empeg w/ the key in ignition, then cranked the car.. The empeg usually just blanks the screen for half a sec and then keeps playing.
-mark

...proud to have one of the first Mark I units

It's a 2000 Accord SE. It's that really nifty dark metallic green color. In certain light, it looks black, in other light, it looks very green.

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Thanks for replying so quickly, Hugo. I'm off to Radio Shack now to get the parts. I'll let you know how it goes!

One question: These are all wired in-line, in series, right? Like this...

Car battery-> Diode-> Capacitor-> Capacitor-> Capacitor-> Empeg

Right? The capacitors don't have to be wired in parallel or anything, do they?

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Brand new or not, Hondas have always used high RPM starter motors to reduce cranking current and therefore voltage drop at the battery. This is as a result of their heritage as a motorcycle manufacturer. They also use tricks like lifting exhaust valves during cranking to drop the compression and get it to fire faster during the first few cylinder fills.

If your Accord is dropping enough battery voltage during cranking to cause the empeg to reset, then you have either got a dud battery out of the factory gates or there is something wrong with your charging circuit, ie. the main alternator regulator. My Mini (with a seriously crap old battery) cranks 55A @ 11.3V, and this is insufficiently low to cause a full re-boot.

At the risk of sounding like a know-it all car freak, I would measure your battery voltage during cranking (cold) and check this out, since it doesn't sound right. My neighbour has a two-year old Accord which cranks just under 30A @12.2V on his original battery, if this helps. And yes, I can quote these figures from memory 'cos I had to fix the damn thing two weeks back

Not every "ultra-reliable" Honda is 100% reliable, even from new; within one week of buying my CBR 600 in 1992, I had a battery failure, regulator failure, and gearbox oil seal failure - and no, I was not revving the nuts off it from cold, neither were the weather conditions especially bad, and after lashing somewhere near to 6 grand on my first new bike, I was looking after it properly

I would look again. You said it yourself - "straight off the lot" - but how long has it been on the lot? (An aside: I bought a "new" Rover 200 two years ago, and discovered it was actually brought into Holland almost one whole year before I drove it away. Where the hell had it been for that whole year?)

Do not presume even new cars are 100% - I seem to spend a significant proportion of my weekends fixing people's cars, including some new ones where the owners are rash enough to trust me over the garage and their warranty

He**, Tony - don't wire it like this, whatever you do or you will really screw things up!!!

Capacitors don't allow DC current flow, so putting in line with the the empeg will result in an awful lot of nothing happening, but there is a chance the capacitors will attempt to charge by drawing current from the empeg. NOT cool!

Diode goes in series to the power feed of the empeg, capacitors in parallel between the feed and ground. Re-read Hugo's note.

Okay, so you mean...

Battery -> Diode -> Empeg
And also
Ground -> Capacitor -> Capacitor -> Capacitor -> Empeg

Or do you mean for the second part
Ground -> 3 Caps in parallel -> Empeg?



Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Okay, so I tried it this way:

Battery->Diode->Empeg
and also
Ground->1 Capacitor->Empeg

And it pretty much worked. It didn't keep the Empeg actually on and running while the engine's being cranked, but it kept the Empeg from fully rebooting. Instead, it just went dark and came back, just like it used to on my GTI.

One difference, though: Now, when it comes back, it's got the little battery-boo-boo-icon showing for a few seconds after coming back. I assume that the capacitor is charging during that time? If that battery-boo-boo-icon is showing only for a few seconds, that's OK, right?

In any case, I also tried it with Ground-> 3 caps in parallel-> Empeg, and it produced the same results. Should I try Ground-> Cap-Cap-Cap -> Empeg?

Also, I'm not certain that I've wired the caps correctly? They don't have a "black stripe" like hugo said. They have a label on the side with a minus sign and an arrow. I have the minus sign arrow pointing to the ground connection. Is that right?

Are there any other side-effects I should know before I wire this up permanently? Will it be constantly draining my battery or anything?

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Battery->Diode->Empeg
and also
Ground->1 Capacitor->Empeg

...where empeg in this case should be the empeg positive feed terminal.

Should I try Ground-> Cap-Cap-Cap -> Empeg?

NOOOOO unless you have got extremely large caps, and a bucket of money for the repair required work afterwards.

also tried it with Ground-> 3 caps in parallel-> Empeg, and it produced the same results

This should be correct. Make sure all your caps are rated around 25V minimum. You will not stop the empeg going into powerfail, but it will blank screen.

They have a label on the side with a minus sign and an arrow. I have the minus sign arrow pointing to the ground connection. Is that right?

These sound like can electrolytic capacitors. You seem to have them the right way from this description.

Are there any other side-effects I should know before I wire this up permanently? Will it be constantly draining my battery or anything?

Not that I'm aware of, but I think (personally) I would be prepared to put up with re-boots or check the battery...

Thanks for all your help!

For those following this thread, Rob S. sent me the correct wiring diagram in a private e-mail:

>        diode
>(+)------>|-----------------[empeg+]
>                |  |  |    
>                =  =  = Caps
>                |  |  |    
>(-)-------------------------[empeg-]

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Well, I got it all wired up and permanently installed. I'm very happy with it. It no longer does a full reboot when I start my car, and there's no longer a big speaker pop (just a small one). Sometimes, if it's just in standby mode, the LED won't even stop pulsing.

It has a slightly odd behavior, where after the engine is started, it shows the "powerfail" icon for a few seconds, and then there's a brief pause in playback. But it's still better than a full reboot.

Thanks a bunch for the suggestions and help, Rob S. and Hugo.

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Don't worry, it won't drain your battery: the caps will draw power to charge themselves up (which isn't a lot of energy compared to the battery) and will keep themselves topped up - but this is only the leakage current of the caps, which is very very small.

The battery icon means "The voltage went below 10v, but the CPU kept running so I turned the screen back on again". Whilst the icon is on the screen powerfail is disabled. It's nothing to worry about, we added the icon as some people had such bad batteries they were running below 10.16v *constantly* and didn't know it :)

Hugo

nifty dark metallic green color

---

Heh - I've got the purple/black combo:)
-mark

...proud to have one of the first Mark I units

Thanks for the info on the powerfail icon. That's good to know.

Related question: do you know why it has a pause in playback when it restarts? The sequence goes like this:

- Unit is playing.
- I start the car.
- Unit goes dark and silent while the engine is cranking.
- When the engine is done cranking (about 1-2 sec), the display comes back (with the powerfail icon showing) and the unit continues playing.
- The powerfail icon goes away after a couple of seconds.
- About 1/2 second after the powerfail icon goes away, there is a very short pause in the audio playback. The pause only lasts about 1/10th of a second.
- After that, it's fine.

Interestingly, I can also get the "pause" if I crank the engine while it's in sleep mode. If I press a button to wake up the unit quickly after the engine has been started, it'll start playing and the same pause will happen a couple of seconds into the playback.

Like I said, it's not a problem. It's still better than a full reboot when I start the car. I just wondered if you knew why it happened.

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

In my experience what you describe is normal behaviour. Ever since i've had the empeg i've been putting up with failed reboots. Never is a problem during the first boot, but if it is powercycled (eg when starting the engine, or unplugging ac power for 5 seconds or so) it often fails to come back up. I'm gonna try that thing with the capacitors though, it will be cool not to have to wait for the empeg to boot when starting the engine.

In my experience what you describe is normal behaviour. Ever since i've had the empeg i've been putting up with failed reboots.

I would have assumed the same thing, except that it only became a problem after I moved the stereo from the GTI to the Honda.

I'm still wondering what caused the failed reboots. I mean, I know it had to do with the voltage fluctuation, and I've cured that with the capacitors. But what I don't understand is why it would cause the unit to lock up on the Empeg logo screen, and why it would be intermittent. Perhaps there's something in the firmware that expects the voltage fluctuation to happen in a particular pattern, and my car doesn't have that pattern. For instance, maybe the firmware sends a spin-up-the-drives command too soon because the voltage briefly comes up past a certain threshold, but then it drops again and the drives fail.

Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

I would have thought that the problem is more likely to be associated with the IDE drives. At low voltage, the spin-up current required by the drive motor is likely to pull down the voltage lines for the processor on the disk's controller. This is a frequent complaint on the BSD hardware discussion groups - that the drive controllers themselves get into a screwed up state that effectively puts them out of reach of the system. They latch up and do not respond to commands (mainly due to inadequate voltage regulation and no processor voltage monitoring on the controllers - IDE is Low Cost, don't forget), and the only way to recover is a power cycle for the drive. In this case, SCSI is superior.

I don't think that the player is to blame; the Linux kernel should be doing drive retries to try and get them to respond, but it won't succeed. The player software is probably pending on kernel drive start operations. There is no mechanism for the ARM to power-cycle the drives (physically) and I am not so sure that there is a strategy actually built into the kernel to deal with a situation where the drive controllers don't come up as expected.

If you want to check this, you could run the SYSLOG daemon in the background (permanently) and set up kernel logging to look at what the kernel thinks is happening when this situation occurs.

Actually, whilst we can't power cycle the drives we can do a hard reset on them under software control - if we can replicate the problems you're having, we can almost certainly fix them.

Any pointers apart from it locking up on the logo screen? There was a problem fixed back int he beta6/7 days which had the same symptoms, but that went away a long time ago.

Hugo

Any pointers apart from it locking up on the logo screen?

Well, since the capacitors fixed the problem for me, I can't reproduce it for you any more. But assuming that my problem was the same as Schofiel's problem, here is what I knew about it:

1) It was intermittent. Sometimes I would crank the engine and the unit would reboot fine. Other times, it would reboot to the logo screen and freeze there permanently.

2) It didn't seem to matter whether the unit was in sleep mode or in playing mode.

3) Removing and re-inserting the Empeg made it fully reboot and work OK. The only time that this seemed to happen was on engine cranking: When the voltage would drop but not go away completely.

4) When it froze, it would freeze at the logo screen and you'd never see the bootup text scrolling by (which usually came after the logo screen). Obviously, no button-pressing would fix it at that point.

5) It only happens on certain cars. On my GTI, it was fine, but on my 2000 Honda, it happened. I can only assume it's because of what was reported elsewhere on this thread: That Hondas use a high-RPM starter motor which draws more juice. Plus, my Honda has a bunch of electric/electronic stuff built in (factory security system, etc.) that all fires up when I start the car, and could be contributing to the voltage loss.


Tony Fabris
Empeg #144

Any pointers apart from it locking up on the logo screen? There was a problem fixed back int he beta6/7 days which had the same symptoms


Finally found time to log back into this web BBS thingy and try to navigate the posts :)

Yeah things were much worse back then, and indeed i think it was beta6 that fixed most of it for me. But a recent build seems to have broken it a little. It doesn't happen as often but it does still happen.

I've got two symptoms that might be related.

1) In the car. This happens occasionaly, hasn't happen for a few weeks, but then i haven't driven my car much in the last few weeks (riding the old bike to work, keeping fit for the approaching ski season ). It seems to happen more often on particulary hot days, but down here at the bottom of new zealand just up from antartica it doesn't get that hot, rarely above 30 deg C in summer, so if it were that i'd expect people a little closer to the equator to see it more...

Anyway what happens is i turn the car on, usually the first boot is fine. Now either i'm in accessory at this stage (engine not running) eg to listen to music while everyone gets into the car, or i've been driving round with it playing fine, then i stop the engine (eg to fill up with petrol) leave it in accessory so the empeg keeps on playing fine without intrruption, then start the engine to drive away. So everones loaded in, or i'm all filled up with petrol so i start the engine... damn the empeg didn't boot. In my car the empeg always does a full reboot when i start the engine. So i pull it out of the sled, and push it back in 5 seconds later, sometimes it boots, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes, particulary when it is hot, i have to leave it for 5 mins or so before it will boot.

This is not the same symtoms i was seeing in beta 4/5. In those days the empeg logo would come up on the display and then it would stop, the problem i am having now is that it doesn't even get that far. Sometimes i get no indication of life at all,othertimes the blue led comes on and stays on forever, until i pull it out of the sled (or switch the car off). Usually no more than 3 removals from from the sled and reinsertions are required, but like i said, sometimes it seems like it's never gonna boot and i just leave it for 5 minutes.


2) Second problem is much more reproduceable.
Take the emeg inside and plug it into the supplied AC adaptor. Empeg boots and works fine. Remove power. Wait 10 seconds, insert power, 50% chance the empeg won't boot. Same symptoms as in 1) sometimes blue led displays, sometimes nothing. Sometime removing and reapplying power fixes it, sometimes i need to leave it for 5-10 mintues. (This actually happend to me the first day i ever used my brand new empeg, thought it was bust, by when i took it home from work and plugged it in, it worked, seemed to fix itself during the 30minute rest while i took it home)


Of course murphy has come stepped in. I just tried following my step of instructions in 2) and it boots everytime. So it seems to be intermittent. I'll try to make good notes of the curcumstances next time it happens.

Interestingly, I can also get the "pause" if I crank the engine while it's in sleep mode. If I press a button to wake up the unit quickly after the engine has been started, it'll start playing and the same pause will happen a couple of seconds into the playback.

As sort of a late follow-up to this old message, I want to report that this doesn't happen any more, now that Mike and Hugo did some work on the kernel to fix the random track skips just before the release of 1.0.

Darn, if I'd knew that this bug was related to the track-skipping bug, I would have brought it to Mike's attention sooner. Oh well. All's well that ends well, right?

___________
Tony Fabris

(off topic)

Hugo! You have/had an empeg in a CRX? I remember some of the first photos of the MK1 were in a CRX dash, that was yours?

Here's the CRX I am putting my MK2 into.

The only thing I have yet to find out is if my stereo installer will be clever enough to sleuth the pinouts for the factory CD player (a dedicated CD player, connecting to a factory head unit, no logic between the two, other than power-on indicator) so I can AUX it into the empeg...otherwise, I'll have to find an aftermarket CD player that plugs into a 3/4 DIN height spot (where otherwise you probably had a storage cubby hole under your deck.)



--------------------
Reg #57xx, Ser #080000141, Rec'd Aug.11/00

Yes, the CRX was mine. It was sold complete with Mk1 player, amp and speakers :) (one way to jump the queue...)

My model was the CRX VTEC (you didn't get this one in the states ;) ) which had the 150bhp VTEC engine, closely related to the one in the later Del Sol. Bonnet slightly different, nicer rear spoiler, leather seats as standard and absolutely mad engine :)

ISTR the cubbyhole, so I never noticed it as a possible CD mounting point... the empeg sled fits like a glove into the CRX, though.

Hugo

(just checked your site: the new exhaust (tip?) you have on looks exactly like the VTEC one (ie, chrome oval) and your spoiler isn't the standard '91 black-plastic type - my one looked just like that too...)

Yes...its all too painfully-common knowledge here about our weaker 108HP model. I had a choice this summer: import a CRX VTEC (B16A) motor from Japan (same as UK spec, I believe) or get the empeg. I've been waiting just about as long for both.


(more on topic...)


> ISTR the cubbyhole, so I never noticed it as a
> possible CD mounting point... the empeg sled fits
> like a glove into the CRX, though.

I'll keep that in mind, in case my installer (well, my substitute installer, my normal guys' on vacation for three weeks...grr) gives me any BS about needing extra time to install it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - --
MK2 #141, green, 12GB