Author Topic: 6 Flashing Red lights  (Read 1883 times)

cecilrhode

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6 Flashing Red lights
« on: June 06, 2019, 09:38:14 AM »
I've had an accident while updating the firmware on my LS-CHL.
Everything seemed to be ok. The dialog box said unit was booting and there was a progress bar that I think indicated the formatting progress, although there was no title.
As the progress bar reached the end (although it may have been about to reset itself and start again), I accidentally closed the updater.

I'm left with the unit and 6 red flashing lights. The flashes are all the same length so it's either E6X or E06 and as the only mention of 6 flashes in the manual is "E06 - corrupted firmware" I guess that's what it is.

So, did closing the updater prevent the FW update to finish or was it the formatting that didn't finish?

The LS doesn't respond to pings and cannot be found by the updater or by Nasnavi.

What do I do from here?

1000001101000

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #1 on: June 06, 2019, 01:09:28 PM »
maybe. It depends on where the process was when you closed it but one way or another it sounds like the boot files are now gone/corrupted.

If taking the device apart is still out of the question you can try fore re-installing the firmware by booting into EM mode via TFTP
https://buffalonas.miraheze.org/wiki/Restoring_Stock_Firmware_via_TFTP

cecilrhode

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #2 on: June 06, 2019, 02:08:20 PM »
Thanks 4200 ;)
Are you the only one who posts? LOL
I've just finishing doing this... all looks ok so far, will post again shortly when i've checked the results

update
well, that was surprisingly easy... sort off.

The TRTP bit went smoothly, completely trouble free, almost. I had read a bit about TRTP yesterday when looking for solutions. Teh problem started after TRTP. The unit sat there looking totally normal but inaccesible by any means and not seen on the network.

I tried rebooting and noticed that the 'off' switch didn't work so it meant pulling the plug. I troied this a few times, tryingto get it seen by Nasnavi or Updater. To No avail. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw it was on emergency mode with a strange IP. After that, using Updater proved no trouble, all went ok. It now switches off by the switch. ( I have no idea why it suddenly went into EM)

Results.
Surprisingly, all the settings are still there, including shares etc, users, even the NTP server.

Disappointingly, it is still not possible to format or check the disk. The options are still not available.

The only new problem, is that the user shares cannot be removed. The tick box to select a share isn't available. The only user share seems corrupted and cannot be browsed although I have renamed it.

I've created a new share and can add/delete files and folders in that one, but I can't remove that share either.

Here's a picture of how it was before

https://www.dropbox.com/s/nu409th35fjwjdh/LS7%20Capture.JPG?dl=0


Here's one as it is now, you can see the selection box for each share isn't available. The share 'Mercury' was removed after this screen shot and hasn't been lost by the problem.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/g73jyeqe494dph7/Now%20Capture.JPG?dl=0

Now, does binary 4200 or anyone have any ideas about how to remove shares when the menu won't allow it? I tried briefly wioth pUTTY but I'm not familiar with it and it wouldn't accept my feeble attempts.

Secondly, can full menu functions be obtained by another update? Or anyother method?

(My apolopgoies for my (even more) bad typing. I only have one working arm and I've had an accident and cut the fingers of it, so typing is a bit clumsy and quiote painful.)
« Last Edit: June 06, 2019, 02:50:27 PM by cecilrhode »

1000001101000

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #3 on: June 06, 2019, 03:16:28 PM »
@oxygen8 is pretty good with these type of issues though he's in a pretty different timezone (I assume)

Most of my suggestions revolve around physically removing the drive but if that is off the table there are still some options available though they are complicated. I'm assuming since you've attempted formatting the device that you don't need any data from it.

You could boot into the Debian Installer for this device via TFTP the same way you got into EM Mode, then:
Execute a shell from the installer menu
overwrite the entire device with 0's (dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=512)
Then either attempt to install the Buffalo firmware again or continue and install Debian instead.

Overwriting the drive with zero's forces the drive to access every sector and allows the drive to recognize and mark any bad sectors if it fails to write to them. It wouldn't change the fact that the drive is starting to wear out if that's what the problem is but it could allow you to get it up and running again. If you do install Debian then you could install SMART utilities to assess the drive's health.

If you want to go that route the installer files can be found here:
http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/stretch/main/installer-armel/current/images/orion5x/network-console/buffalo/ls-chl/

cecilrhode

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #4 on: June 06, 2019, 04:05:06 PM »
Hi
well if you don't mind, post your steps with the LS drive taken out. I might be able to get my neighbour to help tomorrow. He works shifts but is off tomorrow.

I've had a look at Debian and TBH it looks a bit beyond me  :(

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cecilrhode

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #6 on: June 06, 2019, 06:38:41 PM »
Hi 1000001101000, as I tried to post the below, I was told a new reply was posted, so I'll just post this here as is

Thanks for your help 1000001101000 but I managed to fix it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :) :) :) :)

I looked at your instructions in my other thread about taking it out etc and I decided to have one last go at it in situ and after that trying to get the drive out. Problem with that is my neighbour isn't the most mechanical minded and is hamfisted as well so that didn't bode well. If that wasn#'t succesful I was considering simply getting a new drive, and getting some help to put it in my PC case and simply using it as another physcal disk. I can share that disk so it would do the same job.

I did the TRPT, after a few false starts it worked. When i tried to use the Updater, it gave me an error about not being sure teh partition was there. I tried a few (many) times, then remembered I'd read something about partitions. There's a huge amount of stuff on the www about these units, but a lot of the links are dead butI knew I'd read it very recently in my searches. I looked at all the pages I'd bookmarked since I had this problem and searched for a few terms. One of teh pages suggested by you came up and I followed most of the advice from this:

http://www.herzig-net.de/prog/?page=unbrick_ls-wxl

(in case the above link goes dead at any time, for my reference as much as anyone else! lol) In the updater, in debug mode, I deselected all of the update stuff on the left side, and selected all on the right except for 'delete user config'. I let it work, and eventually the LS rebooted, and was shown in Nasnavi and webUI. I didn't need to follow the rest of his steps to select all the update stuff on teh debug mode. As he points out, the LS UI is in japanese after the boot. He didn't mention that the passwprd is reset but I figured that out. I was able to login, change the language setting and then configure it.

The best thing is, all user shares were deleted including the corrupt one, and I was able to create new ones. The menu also allows the disk managment options to be selected - disk format and checking. Tomorrow, I'll do the disk check. As you said, if I used Debian to do it, it'd identify any bad sectors, hopefully this disk check will do the same, so If there are lots of bad areas, maybe it's a sign that the disk is failing.

Thanks for your help.


cecilrhode

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Re: 6 Flashing Red lights
« Reply #7 on: June 07, 2019, 05:59:58 AM »
Just an update. I ran the disk check feature earlier. It took just a few minutes so it obviously isn't checking every cluster, so any defective clusters may not be marked. shame