Welcome to... then Black Screen. RP4, status lights okay, config changes to no avail

Hi all. I'm trying to set up a RP4 but no matter what I do I can't get it to finish booting. My red status light is solid red and I've tried two different power supplies so I'm convinced it's not the PS. The green LED also flashes randomly, no pattern visible, so unless it's 1/2 flashes which I can't tell, I think the green LED is fine. After the welcome screen, the screen will go black and eventually the green light starts to die down (flashing very little to possibly even stopping). In addition my monitor makes noises which make it seem like somethings trying to connect, but nothing happens. I've googled quite a bit since I've encountered it yesterday, and found several things I could try in config.txt between hdmi_safe, the hotplug, and hdmi mode (which I made sure to turn on separately from hdmi_safe to prevent other settings overriding). None of these worked, however I'm willing to try them again if anyone has any suggestions

if anyone has any suggestions, please @ 🙏

Just realized <#982351314132566036> might be better for this. oops 🤧

If a moderator sees this, maybe consider listing <#982351314132566036> with <#1047463526043746304> in the extra message below <#818405026744500224>

Are you using enough power?

And did you image the OS yourself or is it some old thing?

Is the SD Card corrupted? Sometimes it can be from it too old and being in read-only

And headless is good for debugging, many messages appear there such as the "low voltage" warning message that did appear to me when I under-amp a RPi3

yeah I know you used 2 different ps but make sure their enough to actually power it

if it's a plug or something make sure it can supply 5v 3a by checking the bottom

unless you have maybe some suggestions on how? i do have a usb to ethernet so i can give it direct access to an ethernet.

maybe i could hotspot something with my phone even though that seems super hacky lmao

Oh, yeah you imaged so it wrote in it, the only thing I would do in that case is to edit the image until it works via the imager, maybe have SSH enabled and connect the Pi to your mobile hotspot and then SSH via FiSSH https://f-droid.org/en/packages/ro.ioanm.fissh/

Steps to troubleshoot: 1. Boot sequence. The green LED can blink in different patterns, check https://support.pishop.ca/article/33-raspberry-pi-act-led-error-patterns 2. Lack of power. There is two main reasons for this. - Undersized power supply. Raspberry Pi foundation have recommendation for what amperage the power supply should deliver. - Undersized USB cable. There is USB cables with to high resistance (not enough area) in the cable. So check that your using a USB cable that meets the specification. 3. SD Cards. They have a limited amount of Read/Write cycles and that can cause failure. There is error compensation techniques but they are also limited. And more recent versions of Raspberry Pi 4 (with updated eeprom) & 5 can also boot from USB storage devices. So try to boot from a USB storage device to exclude any SD card/card reader failures. 4. Downloaded images. It happens from time to time that downloaded images can be corrupted. That is one of the reasons that there is a "Show SHA256 file integrity hash". Use the SHA256 tool sha256sum to check the hash. 5. HDMI displays. Some displays isn't been autodetected by Raspberry Pi. Here you can change the file /boot/config.txt. Another way is to start with the Lite OS that hasn't a Graphical GUI. If you get a login screen with "Lite OS" then you have a functional display that can't be detected correctly by Raspberry Pi. An more elaborated troubleshooting guide can be found here: https://elinux.org/R-Pi_Troubleshooting

Yea so far I've checked out 1, 2 and 5 and I think they're safe to rule out, except for an asterisk on 5. I can only see 1 happening if it's a really short pulse or two at the beginning, but given the activity on the green LED even after that, I don't think it is, it seems to be nominal 3 I feel would've also been ruled out by the activity on the SD card, but the USB suggestion is good nonetheless so I'll keep that in my back pocket. 4 wouldn't be affected if I'm trying multippe recently downloaded images with the Imager would it? That seems unlikely. Admittedly, i think 5 is the most likely case, given the symptoms. but ive tried quite a few things to no avail. I'll try the lite thing and the SSH on a hotspot soon to see if I can do some additional diagnosing

unfortunately i got sick and now have 6 problem sets due this week ✨ so this might have to be on the back burner.

I wrote it as a generic TS from previous experience and I agree with your conclusions. As for 4. it happens rarely, but when troubleshooting it can be a idea to start with a clean slate and rethink the steps.

So it is indeed the monitor

but I still can't figure out what's up

Got the colored splash screen

As well as a split second of a text cursor

Then black screen

😭

I can SSH in so it's not a kernel panic

No more "no signal"

Now it's a black screen with a cursor blinking

Can you try the Raspberry PI with another display, a friend, work, school?

Was really surprised because I got the splash screen but it wouldn't work on the DE.

I would've never expected that.

I have had one also...

try these commands

actually

try a safe boot

at the top of your config.txt file it should say something about deleting this line safe mode boot under the HDMI section

remove that line and try starting

it should boot in a lower resolution

you can also try changing the frequency and resolution with commands

from your ssh

it sounds like a power issue to me

but you might be able to make the display function

you can also increase the hdmi from 4 to 8 in your config.txt file

oh it's resolved

90% of the time it's a cord, fun fact

It would work fine until boot

So i never expected it to be it

I took like a year of networking in high school

they literally said it's usually the wire so that's the best place to start troubleshooting

good stuff

oh