CP200d VHF brain dead?

[tropiradio]

Got this CP200d VHF which was working perfectly for months and now seems to be completely dead as there is absolutely no activity or indication other than it lights up the front green LED upon power up, but the LED stays on continuously after that, no boot confirmation tones at all, none of the side buttons operate, or even any alert tone when radio is set to an unprogrammed channel. The radio will not even power down with the power switch. I actually have to remove the battery for the green LED to turn off.

I tried to read the radio with CPS 16 (it was programmed this way some time ago) without any luck as it is not even seen by CPS, and sure enough in Device Manager cannot even see a network port being opened as it usually happens when a functioning radio is connected. The programming cable works perfectly with other radios, so that is not suspect. The radio was not dropped or was even in the charger when this problem happened. According to the user, one evening it was working, the next morning out of the blue the issue started.

Anyone have an idea of how to possibly solve this problem? Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[K2NEC]

What changed between the last time it was functioning and today? Obviously something happened with the radio and it seems like it might be stuck in a boot loop or flashzap mode.

 

[tropiradio]

I am not the regular user of the radio, but the daily routine is take the radio out of the charger in the morning, use it all day, put it back into the charger in the afternoon until next day. So what I know changed is that it was working to not working as described earlier. I even spoke to the user to try and find out if this issue started after something happened to the radio, like a hard fall, or was it perhaps left powered on while in the charger, not that would matter, but perhaps a power surge, etc. But no, it was just turned off in the evening and the next morning it was like brain dead. There is nothing loose inside the radio, as sometimes it happens that after a really hard fall one of the board shields in rare ocassions do detach from the board and might short something. Nor any indications of corrosion as when the radio was dropped into water. Everything looks absolutely clean and normal inside and on the board.

Is there any way of forcing a flash on a radio like this? I have heard a bit about this flashzap utility you mentioned which I believe is used to force a firmware reload into a radio that is no longer responding, but have never used it, or even sure how its done. I assume its some sort of program, and hopefully it can be used with the regular programming cable? Where to download a trusted file of the program? And how does one put the radio into flashzap MODE?

Can anyone give me some pointers about the above please?

 

[K2NEC]

I'd send the radio to a shop for repair.

 

[tropiradio]

If that was a viable option I would have mentioned it. But it is not. I am not in the US and sending it and getting it to the "nearest" shop and back plus any repair fees are going to be around the cost of a new (plain) radio. I rather keep it in my shop and find a solution in-house, I am sure there are at least some option to try. Worst case I look for a cheap one that is ugly but working on ebay and use the board to fix this one. But before I do that as a very last resort, want to exhaust any other more viable options.

How about the flashzap option, can anyone tell me more about this?
How is the radio put into flashzap mode? I tried searching for this but came up empty. Just in case this might be related to the issue of the radio, perhaps the operator accidentally pushed one of the side buttons while powering up the radio, not sure if possible as I don't know how this radio is put into flashzap mode.

Thank you.

 

[K2NEC]

Check your PM's OP

The radio is put into FZ by pressing the bottom button and PTT while powering up. This can't be done on accident, the user would intentionally want to do this.

 

[tropiradio]

Hi, I got theses same instructions a while ago on another forum and did it, the radio came up in what seemed a normal boot sequence. Then turned the radio back off, and on normally, and it now just seems to work perfectly again. Rx and Tx normal. Was this Flashboot alone supposed to correct the problem?

 

[K2NEC]

Seems like you got your answer already

 

[tropiradio]

Yes I know it worked, but was just putting the radio into flashmode supposed to alone correct the issue? It is my understanding that it is meant to reflash radios that are otherwise non responsive to regular CPS interaction, so wondering if this was just an unexpected [lucky] result or is it comon procedure to restore some radios by just putting it into flashmode? Thanks.