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by letstrynvm 2741 days ago
I have one of these on the way.

The main surprise for me is they're shipping it without the lcd panel working.

They can control the backlight. But no video.

Now I'm participating in the gamble that can be made to function without rework, I'd at least like complete details, not "we are talking to the panel vendor".
3 comments
blackcain 2741 days ago
That's why the support channels were setup. Also, there still isn't a lot of details to share in the first place. The problem comes down to sending the initalization codes to the panel, which for some reason is not working. The conversations continues. Now you're as up to date as the rest of the librem 5 team.

I didn't want to drop into overly technical detail as not everyone wants that. You are of course welcome to participate in the community forum that was setup to chat about the state of the dev kit.

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letstrynvm 2740 days ago
One of the unusual and desirable things about this is your customers for the dev board will largely be very experienced... you acknowledge it in the letter you sent out.

What surprised me is until it's fixed, there's no certainty what the problem is. Eg, dsi lanes mixed up, polarity of dsi lane wired wrong, some semidocumented reset signal on the panel got forced to 0V or forced inactive but panel requires it strobed, psu to panel must come up in specific order, psu level or quality or wiring mismatch... there are many possible ways just from having no video it can be a hw rework issue to solve it. Of course dsi is also complex, it can easy be a sw-only config issue, or some combination.

It's not up to me as your paying customer to go ask on a 'support channel' why, it's up to you to explain the reasoning why you believe that's a software-only issue.

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megous 2741 days ago
According to the status matrix, there's also no I2S from the BT/WWAN, meaning no audio from the modem and bluetooth. (probably meaning it's untested, or the driver/DT is missing)
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blackcain 2740 days ago
The modem audio is not sent over i2s with the SIMCom SIM7100, it is going over a USB connection as raw PCM and is managed by haegtesse. https://source.puri.sm/Librem5/haegtesse
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megous 2740 days ago
Interesting. Perhaps I can investigate if USB audio is possible with a USB connected 3G module I'm using in a tablet, too. That would certainly simplify some things.

Thank you very much for a lead!

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jononor 2741 days ago
Hmm, that's ballsy. Not a good sign that they are making such risky moves, so soon in the project.

But hardware is never easy. Lets hope it works out.

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