[TG] [TG11] a95 MFD doing continual reboot

[choroj]

I have a 3 year old a95 MFD and recently installed a new Evolution (E1) autopilot. My boat is a Mirage 35 (sail). In addition to the new autopilot (it replaced an older Raymarine autohelm), I also have an i60 wind package and ST60 depth and speed instruments.

After hooking up the new autopilot (which involved getting rid of some older wiring and hooking everything up using the new cabling), I tested the instruments and all worked fine. In fact my i60 now showed true and apparent wind without my having to do some specific initiation which I had to do in the past. I completed the autopilot dockside set up and everything went as by the book. The MFD worked fine at this point too.

Before completing the sea trial set up, I decided I should check for software updates and downloaded the software update for the E1 and ACU. However, I now think that was a mistake because I think all I should have done was download the update for the MFD (which I think would have included the E1 and ACU). I put the SD card into the MFD and turned on the instruments, then the MFD. The MFD went into a continual reboot mode and never properly set up. The instruments (including the autopilot) worked fine.

I then reformatted the SD card and reinstalled only the MFD update (v19.03). However, it made no difference - the MFD went into continual reboot again. What I discovered via trail and error was that if I turned off the instruments, the MFD worked fine. Then if I turned on the instruments, the MFD went into reboot mode again. So clearly the MFD does not like the instruments being on.

I am assuming that data from the instruments is messing up the MFD. Any thoughts on how to fix this? I plan on trying to reset the factory settings on the autopilot and the i60 in the hopes that this might work, but I thought I would ask the forum.

[Tom - Raymarine - Moderator]

Hello Choroj,

Does the MFD only reboot if the upgrade SD card is inserted, even if the instruments are connected?
What happens if you start the MFD with the card not in (or instruments not connected) and the insert/connect after the MFD is running?

There's no compatibility problem between the instruments, pilot and MFD, per se, but you might get similar symptoms if:
- your SD card had a developing hardware fault. SD cards are made at low cost in large volumes and fail fairly often, and sometimes this can cause problems for one device even whilst the card appears to work ok on another, it depends on what parts of the card media the software is trying to access and how.
- you had a problem with your SeatalkNG network which were causing the MFD's query of network device to produce unexpected results and therefore a software crash
- you have an unrelated problem such as marginal supply voltage to the MFD, and the software upgrade process is just bringing this to light by stressing the system in a different way. On a marginal supply electronics can give a very wide range of unpredictable and seemingly-unrelated problem behaviours.

I'd say don't reset the instruments/pilot, you'll lose calibration and I don't think it will solve the problem.

Let me know the answer to the couple of questions at the top and I'll be able to suggest some next steps.

Regards,
Tom