Playdate has crashed - press A to restart

Hi,

I recently got a playdate but after switching it on i saw the following error message:

"Sorry, Your Playdate has crashed. Press A to restart".

I have tried to boot into recovery mode by pressing and hold A + B + lock + menu, but after loading new firmware I end up back at the crash screen.

I have pushed a pin into the little reset hole a few times to see I can boot into USB mode. After connecting the Playdate into a Windows Laptop i see 5 small files including a version.txt file which says:

build=5f230668fc9b-1.11.1-release.136881-buildbot

Please could anyone let me know how I could fix this playdate? Is there a way to perhaps load firmware through USB as I have not been able to set up an internet connection to update the device through Wi-Fi.

Thanks
Raymond

-- EDIT -- 10.02.2023

I managed to install Playdate simulator and opened the crashlog:

--- crash at 2022/09/28 07:49:19---
build:59185ded27c7-1.12.3-release.140884-buildbot
r0:20024bd0 r1:00001000 r2:2000262e r3: 00002710
r12:00003fe0 lr:08022d75 pc:0803947c psr: 21000000
cfsr:00000082 hfsr:00000000 mmfar:ffffffff bfar: ffffffff
rcccsr:00000000
heap allocated: 349376
Lua totalbytes=357400 GCdebt=-94827 GCestimate=178777 stacksize=40

--- crash at 2022/09/28 07:49:32---
build:59185ded27c7-1.12.3-release.140884-buildbot
r0:00000000 r1:00000000 r2:00030c8b r3: 00000000
r12:006d3000 lr:080307eb pc:08030508 psr: 61000000
cfsr:00000082 hfsr:00000000 mmfar:ffffffff bfar: ffffffff
rcccsr:00000000
heap allocated: 349376
Lua totalbytes=357400 GCdebt=-94943 GCestimate=178777 stacksize=40

I cannot change the time on this device either hence why the dates differ to today's date.

--

We're very sorry for the rough ride your Playdate has given you! :frowning:

Is that literally what happened the first time you turned it on: you got the crashing message?

Also, did you purchase this directly from us, or from another party?

Thanks for respoding Greg

This was a second party purchase - This is the first message I got after switching it on

Try pressing and holding the reset pin for at least 10 seconds and see if that helps at all.

Thanks Will,

After pressing and holding the reset pin for more than 10 seconds that did not work.

Are you getting to the OS at all or just crashing immediately?

The system boots and crashes immediately. After a while of inactivity it will change to the clock.

Hi!
Was there a solution for this issue ? Mine got in this state after teh latest update. After it finished updating it just showed the Play Date logo and the sleep button flashes in white and red :/.

I can access the bootsy drive (I saw some old posts from the developper previews) but I don't have a firmware to try and reflash it.

Maybe you can follow the steps described here to go back to 1.11.1 ?