LifeFlash Reset Loop

[Commander TGK]

Hey everyone, I just got a brand new 4 GB SanDisk flash card that I bought from UsedPDAparts and put it in my lifedrive, I figured it would work right as soon as I hooked it up. But it goes directly into a reset loop, I know that my old microdrive was the problem that I had orginally because it wouldn't even begin to load at the first screen, it was bricked. But with my new flash card in there it just goes into the loop, I tried every reset but nothing worked. When I try and do a hard reset like secure erase, the screen just goes black instead of erasing or resseting. Then I have to press reset to make it work again, but it just goes back to the loop. I have tried taking out the battery, draining the battery, using it without the battery, nothing works, I feel like this must be something simple, but maybe I got a bad card from UsedPDAparts...any help would be greatly appreciated.

[brandon-wan]

have you contacted usedpdaparts about your problem? i'd do that first if you're not having any luck with the resets. sounds like a bad card to me.

[potter]

I know that my old microdrive was the problem that I had orginally because it wouldn't even begin to load at the first screen, it was bricked.
It maybe as brandon-wan says, you got a bad card. However, it is also possible that you had another problem in addition to the microdrive failure; hopefully not. e.g. A static discharge damaged the microdrive and the motherboard.

[Commander TGK]

I have contacted usedpdaparts about this problem, the card was to expensive to just not work. They need to give me either a refund or an exchange. Hopefully a refund because it is possible that my LifeDrive is just defective, and I have no way of knowing...

[ri5*]

I have the "same" issue. Out of the blue my LifeFlash went into reset loop one day and I've not been able to resurect. I'm fearing it's the MB.

I'd upgrade to another device (replaced MB before), but there isn't anything out there to upgrade to.

[Swin]

Mine was in a reset loop recently. I attempted a warm-reset but couldn't quite get it, so I tried the somewhat easier method of opening the hard reset menu, hitting OK to cancel, and then holding down up for the warm reset (being very careful not to press Up before canceling out of the hard reset menu) but I still couldn't get it.

So then I told it to do a secure erase. (Quick erase wasn't an option, oddly.) It went into a secure erase loop! I tried everything to break it out. I took out the card, deleted the partitions, re-created them, restored the original ROM (essentially a quick erase of my own), but no! It wouldn't stop!

Then for some reason I thought I would see what would happen if I put the card in with no partitions whatsoever, and what do you know, it stopped! It was frozen at palmOne sure, but at least it wasn't secure erasing.

So from there I popped the card back out, restored the partitions and data, put it back in, reconnected the battery, and voilà! Perfection!

Looking back on it I should have tried warm-resetting a dozen more times (it's hard with how fast a LifeFlash boots :p). Or perhaps it would have never worked (I must have tried it at least a dozen times of my own).

I attempted to write down what my procedure was rather directly after my success, so this should be fairly close:


Held power switch and reset Palm to open hard erase menu. (This paused the secure erasing.)
Left power on and removed drive. Attached it to the computer.
Deleted partitions in Linux using fdisk:sudo fdisk /dev/XXX
(where XXX is the device, sdc in my case, get it right so that you don't erase the partitions on your computer drives ja? :D)
d 1 (to delete partition 1...)
d 2
d 3
w (to commit changes and write the data) Put back in Palm which still has hard reset menu open, reset Palm.
Palm went to 'palmOne' screen (an improvement!) and stayed here.
Disconnected battery power.
Pulled and reconnected drive to computer again.
Rewrote the partition table and rom partition to drive.
Popped it back in the device, reconnected the power, and success!

I only left the device running because I don't think disconnecting and reconnecting the battery is particularly healthy for a Palm, however it seemed to be necessary at the end. (I seem to recall testing... maybe.)

So there's another potential technique for resurrecting a LifeDrive to keep in mind.

Of course if you received your drive from UsedPDAs then this might seem a bit Greek. I personally originally followed this guide: http://old.hackndev.com/node/196 in Ubuntu (VMWare :D), but this one (Windows) is probably as good (or better): http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=119585.

This is a bit off topic, but: While writing the rom partition, if anyone's feeling particularly cutting edge, I very strongly recommend trimming your ROM down to absolutely as little as possible as suggested in that last link too (use mrp123's list of what he kept, but delete SplashLifeDrive.prc too, as it's been verified that you can). Then you can add the applications back, but this time in RAM, and with the smaller ROM you'll have significantly more DBCache (somewhere around about 60% more), and that means more contiguous free space, and with UDMH and UnCache (with the apps in RAM you can now control if they should receive reset notifications) that's fewer memory errors and fewer resets. :D (A small ROM also speeds up resets and quick erases a hell of a lot too!) Of course you can't blame me if anything goes wrong. :)

Let me know if anyone tries this LD resurrection technique with any success.

[Balentius]

The funny thing is, I just ran into a similar problem - after forgetting to "eject" my handheld from my wife's Mac (I was just transferring files from the SD card!), the main "lifedrive" partition disappeared, and then it locked up. I hit the reset button, and it went into a boot loop - White screen with progress bar, then grey screen - instant reboot back to the white screen.

Unfortunately, I was on a cruise at the time...

After getting home, I took it apart (it is a LifeFlash, of course! :) ), and started poking around. The partitions were still there, but reporting "bad" values for the partition types. Fortunately, I made an image of the card (using dd for windows) before doing anything rash.

Tried changing the partition type - no good. Tried making a new ROM and putting it on there - no good. Grabbed the old microdrive, which I haven't done anything with, and put it back in - no good. Argh...

After hopping on the intertubes, I decided to put the original image back on, and then do a quick erase - and that worked!

If only I'd thought of that 5 days before, I'd still have my sanity... (all of my reading material was on the LifeDrive, so I bought a book from the gift shop.)

Hope that this helps someone - obviously not the original poster, but maybe others.