@dessysGS haha! Same scenario here! DEOT Gameshell = every day driver and regular Gameshell = over night compiled abuse machine.
The battery is basically SHOT in that one from the number of hours used it just compiling.
I would say that your problems with booting up only with a power cable plugged in are battery related.
Unfortunately it’s a consumable part of the Gameshell, although supposedly there a few options, such as the Nokia BL5C battery for older phones, or even a 3DS battery. There are a few threads you can search up using. Here’s one that could be helpful.
I’ve only tried an aftermarket NOS BL5C battery, and unfortunately it doesn’t give much better performance Than the stock Gameshell battery. Then again, I didn’t actually try to fiddle with it enough. Maybe I just need to get a few cycles in to remind it how much capacity it has.
Mmm the wifi is extremely hit an miss at the best of times. I have wifi repeaters in basically every room of my house, and at least that usually works. When it doesn’t, I just reset ALL of the modems (ie I turn of my entire house’s mains powers lol) then everything works.
I will normally just do anything requiring connectivity with Ethernet over USB. You just need a USB micro cable, ie the same one that you use to charge it. Just be careful when searching things up regarding this. A few people have tried using ANCIENT threads from 2 years ago, where information is no longer valid.
In fact in general, check the date before trying to follow any information. If in doubt, post in the thread, and ask if the information contained is still valid before attempting anything. Either myself or someone else would no doubt chime in and report.
As for updating and Retroarch, I’ve taken the liberties of updating all of the assets, cores, shaders and whatever else you could possibly need on the same day as the build of the image. Likewise with an apt-get update && upgrade. So unless you’re installing anything extra, you should be set. I’ve also change the default buildbot URL to one that uses NEON instructions, so potentially you could be using better optimised emulators already over the stock image.
I actually made mention of what the kernel changers do in the first post of this thread. Theoretically, the stock Gameshell image runs at 1008MHz, which is under locked. This is the stock speed according to the image, even though the gameshell is advertised at running at 1.2GHz. Perhaps in the earlier days, it wasn’t stable any faster. Or as we are finding now, some people experience graphical artefacts. I’m reminded of my days overclocking my computer’s GPU, opening up pipelines in the registry, discovering my lesser card is just a higher end card that didn’t quite pass the QC, and was badged as a lower spec card.
@Shwifty - try the underclocked clock speed profile. It uses the 5306 kernel. Failing that, also try the 5406 kernel. That has worked for some people. You’ve got the same revision R16 board as me. I guess, let me know if you want to do a direct “swap” to see if it works. Plus I would love to get my hands on one of the units that doesn’t seem to behave.
@Metonym - glad to hear that someone else out there is also running their system fault free. I was worried I was alone!
Also note, in the kernel section, only the scripts with the numbers independently change the kernel. Stock changes the kernel to stock AND the clock speed go underclocked, ie stock settings. Overclocked changes it to the newer kernel that allowed dynamically governed clockspeeds, and has a silent boot screen. Suspend is the most recent kernel, with the ability to suspend the system, and has a more verbose startup display. It also has the wifi drivers built into the kernel, which should give it more stability than the other two. This is primarily the work of @Joao_Manoel, so all credit should go his way.
The DEOT mode disabling essentially reverts a bunch of files in the ~/launcher/sys.py/UI/ directory to stock, so that you can run any skins etc intended for the stock 0.5 image. I had to change quite a lot to get the exact DEOT look; so much that trying to use a regular skin would cause the machine to hang. It shouldn’t affect anything that runs upon startup. If it does appear to make a difference, try restarting with it enabled again. You may have just gotten lucky with a “good boot up” process, while it’s disabled.
Anyway, I am working on it on and off, trying to find a solution! The more data I have, the more troubleshooting I can do. Keep me updated with what works, and what doesn’t.
Edit: @Shwifty! AH! I just noticed! There is a USB cable plugged into your console, no doubt providing power!
Now. I’m not sure if this is related, but potentially the cable itself could be causing some kind of interference if say, it’s not shielded. This could be in conjunction with the clockspeed varying as you are changing from idle time in the launcher, to using cycles when scrolling.
Try a different cable if you need tethered power. Or even, try no power cable at all.
I do remember for older 2.5” HDD caddies, certain cables didn’t provide enough current, or rather had good much resistance, resulting in failure with HDD spin ups, and detection. The one kind of cable that worked ridiculously well was the one that came with my PS4 and/or PS4. Usually digital cameras come with decent cables too, including a ferrite core; usually to prevent surges etc. The build quality in general from a reputable brand should be sufficient, especially if it’s a heavily gauged cord.