Elcrow T5 no display/BME/GNSS/nRF

[Vlastimir Stankovic]

Hi all,

Thank you for accepting my application and an apology if this might not be the right group for this question.

I am a PPL/UL pilot and take care of our "FLARM"/SoftRF devices in the club I fly.

I am switching our devices from T-Badge+SkyView to an intergrated solution, the T5 (Airventure) and for that purpose, I ordered 2 pieces for testing.

When uploading the SofrRF software (ESP32S3, the one suggested on linars Git on the T5 page.), I get no response on the display (not even backlight) and the status page of the WebUI insists it is a standard edition and no GNSS/BME/nRF.

I even tried to recompile 1.9 (setting hw_info.model to SOFTRF_MODEL_AIRVENTURE in SoftRF.ino). but still showing standard edition.

Any ideas? 

Thanks in advance and clear skies.

[Vlastimir Stankovic]

Apologies, I was referring to the Elecrow M5 of course - it's a bit late around here....

[Moshe Braner]

Welcome!  Alas my version of SoftRF does not support the M5, and I have no experience with Linar's version for the M5.  Linar's code detects the model when it boots, and it sounds like it has a problem detecting your device as an M5.

One reason my version does not support the M5 is because it (like the T-Beam Supreme) has the ESP32-S3 processor.  At this point I cannot compile my version for the S3 because it requires later support libraries (than the plain ESP32) - at least the ESP32 "core" version 2.0.15 for thr Arduino IDE - and those are bigger, so the binary does not fit in the available space.  Somebody could work on a simplified branch of my branch, taking out some features until it fits.  I would rather not do that myself at this time, but can offer some help to somebody else doing that.

The display on the M5 is very small (same size as the T-Echo "badge edition"?).  To integrate SoftRf & SkyView I would think this device is a better device:  https://lilygo.cc/products/t5-e-paper-s3-pro

(I like e-ink displays for sunlight visibility).  If you are happy with the small display, I would suggest staying with the T-Echo - or Thinknode M1 - and adding more display functionality into it if you want.  The T-Echo and the M1 use an nRF52840 processor which is much more power efficient than the ESP32, thus the run time on a charge should be longer.  My branch supports the T-Echo, and I am working on a new version that will also support the M1 - or rather, waiting for Oliver to fix the remaining M1 problems since he has the M1 on hand!   ;-)

Although from my perspective as a glider pilot, I would rather see the traffic on a full-function glide computer (such as XCsoar) rather than on a separate traffic-only display such as SkyView.  Can run XCsoar (or other similar apps) on a variety of hardware, including smartphones, tablets, and e-readers.  And for SoftRF can then use a small device such as the Sensecap T1000-E.  SoftRF can feed the GPS data along with the traffic data to the glide computer, thus the latter does not need its own GPS, which allows use of e-ink e-readers such as the Onyx Boox Go 6.

[Vlastimir Stankovic]

Works now... Re-posting from the Gitter:

After some help from Moshe and others in the Google group, I managed to get a pair of new Elecrow M5 to work. Basically, it seems the flash_id is different on these models: 0xC84016 instead of 0x464016.

After butchering Linar's code, I forced it to find the M5 and it works now. I'll test it on the ground tomorrow to see if everything is working.

@Linar, I am not sure of your flash_id logic so, do you want me to put in another case or try merging? Not really a github user :(

Thanks,
Vlastimir

EEPROM version: 97
WARNING! None of supported RFICs is detected!
WARNING! Barometric pressure sensor is NOT detected.
INFO: ESP32-S3 DevKit is detected.
Flash memory ID: C84016
Hostname: SoftRF-8f36d0
Setting soft-AP configuration ... Ready
Setting soft-AP ... Ready
IP address: 192.168.1.1
HTTP server has started at port: 80

Data output device(s):
NMEA - USB CDC
GDL90 - USB CDC
D1090 - NULL

---

#elif defined(CONFIG_IDF_TARGET_ESP32S3) || defined(CONFIG_IDF_TARGET_ESP32S31)
switch (flash_id)
{
.
.
.
.
case MakeFlashId(GIGADEVICE_ID, GIGADEVICE_GD25Q64):
/* Heltec Tracker has no PSRAM onboard /
esp32_board = ESP32_HELTEC_TRACKER;
hw_info.model = SOFTRF_MODEL_MIDI;
break;
case MakeFlashId(ZBIT_ID, ZBIT_ZB25VQ32B):
case MakeFlashId(TBD_ID, TBD_25Q32):
/
* Elecrow TinkNode M2 has OPI PSRAM in the WROOM module.
* ESP32 Arduino Core 2.0.x is unable to detect OPI PSRAM
* unless we do a psram_type=opi custom build.
/
esp32_board = ESP32_ELECROW_TN_M5; / allow psramFound() to fail */
break;
default:
esp32_board = ESP32_ELECROW_TN_M5;
break;
}

---

SX126x RFIC is detected.
WARNING! Barometric pressure sensor is NOT detected.
INFO: Elecrow ThinkNode M5 is detected.
Flash memory ID: C84016
INFO: GNSS module FW version: URANUS5,V5.3.0.0
Hostname: SoftRF-8f36d0
Setting soft-AP configuration ... Ready
Setting soft-AP ... Ready
IP address: 192.168.1.1
HTTP server has started at port: 80
E (11777) ledc: freq_hz=0 duty_resolution=8

Data output device(s):
NMEA - USB CDC
GDL90 - USB CDC
D1090 - NULL

Thanks to Moshe for pointing out the selection process for the board!

Vlastimir