Hacking Hardware HW FLY V4 OLED Switch not turning on

tvchip · Jan 31, 2023

Hi guys,

I screwed up my HW FLY installation somewhere and now my switch is not turning on. I never managed to get any lights to turn on the mod chip and I also cannot get it to boot into stock now. Essentially pressing the power button does nothing. My battery is showing 4.14V, which I was told is near / full charge. Based on research I found the most likely culprit it somewhere in my nand installation. These are all of my multimeter values.
D = .722
C = .683
A = .458
Nand wire - .685
Nand anchor - OL (reverse = .682 (positive on ground))

I understand in the photos that I grossly over thermal pasted but I've cleaned that up now and will be more careful moving forward. I checked all my points for shorts and nothing appears to be shorted that I can find. I'm hoping I haven't completely screwed myself and am looking for possible solutions. I will likely be taking it to a professional here on out if there is anything to be done.

cowboy619 · Jan 31, 2023

Aaah yes more switch killers. Love the thermal paste there add more to fix it

Anyways! Close up pics of CLk point. Reading is low. And you need to trim all your wires. Too much excess which can cause problems
Most likely killed point clk

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

tvchip · Jan 31, 2023

Yeah I know the thermal paste is hard to look at, makes me look like a complete dunce but thought accuracy was important at this stage. CLK point was damaged by me, i over scraped it and it got connected to ground. I then took it to a soldering shop and they connected a tiny wire from the trace directly to point D. I’ll take a picture when I’m home but it’s not grounded and we are getting a reading.

I’ll also trim my wires!

cowboy619 · Jan 31, 2023

I always recommend noobs to run wires than to use these flex ribbons that are provided

It’s a little more effort but you know all the points are actually connected

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

guily6669 · Jan 31, 2023

I can't help anything sadly, but that paste looks a lot metallic like.

What's the thermal paste used? Make sure it's not conductive and not electrically capacitive (can still cause problems down the line like Arctic Silver 5).

I recommend something like Arctic MX-4 or maybe the new MX-6 or Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, though it will probably not be worth the extra price compared to MX-4 and low temps\low wattage MX-4 might actually still have a edge, the others start to get a bit better mostly on high wattage and high temps PC chips...

Phantomas77 · Jan 31, 2023

Just few questions to sync: when you press the power button, nothing happens, like neither the fan spins? Have you tried disconnecting the 3.3V line to see if the Switch turns on and boots to OFW?

EDIT: @tvchip just noted on the second photo that you posted, that screen connector is not fully inserted.

tvchip · Feb 2, 2023

Phantomas77 said:
Just few questions to sync: when you press the power button, nothing happens, like neither the fan spins? Have you tried disconnecting the 3.3V line to see if the Switch turns on and boots to OFW?

EDIT: @tvchip just noted on the second photo that you posted, that screen connector is not fully inserted.

Hey, yeah with the 3.3V disconnected it does not boot ofw. No fans spinning, no lights, nothing at all. For clarification, is the screen connector the ribbon cable just below the fan? I think see it is not fully connected in the photo as well. Will try properly connecting it and trying another boot up.

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

tvchip said:
Yeah I know the thermal paste is hard to look at, makes me look like a complete dunce but thought accuracy was important at this stage. CLK point was damaged by me, i over scraped it and it got connected to ground. I then took it to a soldering shop and they connected a tiny wire from the trace directly to point D. I’ll take a picture when I’m home but it’s not grounded and we are getting a reading.

I’ll also trim my wires!

Nagaa · Feb 2, 2023

Did you reflow the DAT0 adapter under the emmc ?

tvchip · Feb 2, 2023

Nagaa said:
Did you reflow the DAT0 adapter under the emmc ?

We attempted. We used a hot air solder, however, the video we watched recommended 360 degrees which is what we attempted at first. Since then we realized the temp should have been between 260-300. Super possible we fucked the emmc but we get good readings from the wire? We get OL reading from the anchor point though, not sure what to make of that.

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

guily6669 said:
I can't help anything sadly, but that paste looks a lot metallic like.

What's the thermal paste used? Make sure it's not conductive and not electrically capacitive (can still cause problems down the line like Arctic Silver 5).

I recommend something like Arctic MX-4 or maybe the new MX-6 or Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, though it will probably not be worth the extra price compared to MX-4 and low temps\low wattage MX-4 might actually still have a edge, the others start to get a bit better mostly on high wattage and high temps PC chips...

The thermal paste I used was originally purchased for a custom led light I built but says it is also designed for cpu / gpu’s. From Amazon “

GENNEL 100gram Silver Silicone Thermal Conductive Compound Grease Paste for GPU CPU IC LED Ovens Cooling”

Phantomas77 · Feb 2, 2023

tvchip said:
Hey, yeah with the 3.3V disconnected it does not boot ofw. No fans spinning, no lights, nothing at all. For clarification, is the screen connector the ribbon cable just below the fan? I think see it is not fully connected in the photo as well. Will try properly connecting it and trying another boot up.

The one that you're referring is the power button ribbon cable, which actually does not seem fully inserted as well, let's hope it's the culprit for "no power at all" issue. Check the image below for reference.

So, first remove all the thermal paste with IPA, keep the HWFLY disconnected from 3.3V, make sure that the power and screen ribbon are well inserted and try to power it on again, if it's for short time you don't need thermal paste.

Proceed with much care with the screen connector (the one soldered to the board) while inserting the ribbon cable, it's very fragile and can break if the ribbon cable is not completely aligned (straight) when inserted.

urherenow · Feb 2, 2023

There's a via under CLK, is there not? Point D. If you scraped too much, you could have easily broken the via. The shop adding a wire to the trace might get you a somewhat acceptable reading to the X1, but that doesn't mean the X1 is connecting to what it NEEDS to connect to, from that point.

My first attempt at a mod did just that (my microscope was too small/crappy). But I did get lights on my chip with it, I was just never able to train, and now it's a brick. Wish I knew where the other end of point D went, so I could try to jumper it...

doom95 · Feb 2, 2023

There's no point diagnosing any of the connections unless the 3v3 is actually there. The only thing to focus on now is figuring out why that isn't the case.
Measure resistance to ground from the 3v3 point. If there's a short, figure out where it is and solve that. If there's no short, but no 3v3 output on the output of the max77801etp chip that generates the 3v3, then look at the input of that chip.

Regarding the CLK point: the via under CLK goes through 3 layers. If it's not shorted to ground, and gets a reading, it's very likely to be fine.

guily6669 · Feb 2, 2023

tvchip said:
The thermal paste I used was originally purchased for a custom led light I built but says it is also designed for cpu / gpu’s. From Amazon “

GENNEL 100gram Silver Silicone Thermal Conductive Compound Grease Paste for GPU CPU IC LED Ovens Cooling”

Don't know anything about it, but shouldn't have made a mess with it as it's most likely electrically capacitive and looks a ton more metallic than arctic silver 5 that I wouldn't even trust the part of not being electrically conductive...

Anyway should be more than fine on normal chips with IHS, but I would never trust it on naked die with small components all-around.

That paste seems bad specially for switch, though it's fine for testing but I wouldn't do that mess all around the die with it.

I would fully clean it before trying any repair just to be sure it's not causing any problems.

Ps: sry for not being helpful

tvchip · Feb 2, 2023

doom95 said:
There's no point diagnosing any of the connections unless the 3v3 is actually there. The only thing to focus on now is figuring out why that isn't the case.
Measure resistance to ground from the 3v3 point. If there's a short, figure out where it is and solve that. If there's no short, but no 3v3 output on the output of the max77801etp chip that generates the 3v3, then look at the input of that chip.

Regarding the CLK point: the via under CLK goes through 3 layers. If it's not shorted to ground, and gets a reading, it's very likely to be fine.

Going home and I’ll check for shorts. We noticed a capacitor acting weird. It’s definitely ground on one side (the top), and not ground on the bottom.

Photos here:

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

cowboy619 said:
I always recommend noobs to run wires than to use these flex ribbons that are provided

It’s a little more effort but you know all the points are actually connected

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

There’s a good chance I’m going to end up removing that flex ribbon and adding cables for my sanity. Trying to keep things the same for right now and check individual parts one by one

Nagaa · Feb 2, 2023

tvchip said:
Going home and I’ll check for shorts. We noticed a capacitor acting weird. It’s definitely ground on one side (the top), and not ground on the bottom.

Photos here:

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

There’s a good chance I’m going to end up removing that flex ribbon and adding cables for my sanity. Trying to keep things the same for right now and check individual parts one by one

It's a resistor you should check it in ohms mode on your multimeter

tvchip said:
We attempted. We used a hot air solder, however, the video we watched recommended 360 degrees which is what we attempted at first. Since then we realized the temp should have been between 260-300. Super possible we fucked the emmc but we get good readings from the wire? We get OL reading from the anchor point though, not sure what to make of that.

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

From experience when reflowing the dat0 it already happen that i did it wrong and the switch would not power on anymore 0.47a on the charger, even i had good value on the adapter, a reball of the emmc fixed it

cowboy619 · Feb 2, 2023

tvchip said:
Going home and I’ll check for shorts. We noticed a capacitor acting weird. It’s definitely ground on one side (the top), and not ground on the bottom.

Photos here:

Post automatically merged: Feb 2, 2023

There’s a good chance I’m going to end up removing that flex ribbon and adding cables for my sanity. Trying to keep things the same for right now and check individual parts one by one

Those are resistors, check in ohms mode. Have you got an ammeter not a multimeter to see if it’s actually taking a charge. Post of close up of the pins in the lcd connector

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

tvchip · Feb 2, 2023

Currently at the shop getting the emmc reballed. The technician is a little confused because he says the USB c port is working properly and that there is no short. He’s going to reball it just in case. EDIT: dat chip was loose and not connected properly underneath. Will post again after reball

dygeo · Feb 13, 2023

Hello what do you think of the 3v3 in the photo? and it correct for a hwfly?

Donnie-Burger · Feb 13, 2023

dygeo said:
Hello what do you think of the 3v3 in the photo? and it correct for a hwfly?

Its your c point data adapter. No reball needed unless you gonna run wire and not use adapter. 400ish reading is what you want.

dygeo · Feb 14, 2023

Donnie-Burger said:
C'est votre adaptateur de données point c. Aucun reball n'est nécessaire à moins que vous n'utilisiez un fil et que vous n'utilisiez pas d'adaptateur. 400ish lecture

J'aimerais utiliser ce point qui et du 3.30 v pour brancher la hwfly et oui il faut utiliser un fil le point ce trouve derrière la carte mère.

Hacking Hardware HW FLY V4 OLED Switch not turning on

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GENNEL 100gram Silver Silicone Thermal Conductive Compound Grease Paste for GPU CPU IC LED Ovens Cooling”​

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