SSD upgrade installed, uconsole doesnt boot

uConsole
1

As the title says, I installed the hackergadgets.com NVME SSD upgrade and now, even after installing the adapter board, Pi OS doesn’t boot from the micro-sd card. Ive waited like 5 minutes, and recently the screen flashed white for a bit, and went back to black. This is usual, but it doesn’t take like 4-5mins to happen.

I need help with this. I found a little fpc-looking cable in the battery board’s bag, but didnt do anything with it, as I didnt know what. All I know is that my uconsole turns on, but doesn’t boot from the micro sd card I have.

2

It did the white flash thing again, like 5 mins after the first one.

3

take some pictures of the inside and post them here

4

20260620_173852
20260620_1738521920×3410 1.5 MB

20260620_173921
20260620_1739211920×1081 300 KB

20260620_173858
20260620_1738581920×1081 304 KB

5

Okay I’m trying to install the FPC cable in, but its so short and small, so its been difficult getting in.

6

looking at those images, did you make sure the compute module is fully seated? install the compute module into the adapter make sure both connectors are fully seated, and only then install both boards into the mainboard

7

Yeah I did, but I haven’t got the FPC cable installed, I tried for like half an hour, its so short and small.

8

The normal connection to the battery module is for power only, the FPC is for the PCIE which the NVME will not work without.

I installed my FPC to the CM5 adaptor board before installing the battery module and then installed the FPC connector to the batter module.

AND REMEBER the 5v indicator!

image
image215×294 23.3 KB

9

What do I do about the 5V indicator? Also should the gold pads be facing up or down when in.

10

Okay so pads face down.

The FPC cable is easily slotting into the battery module’s one, but the gap inside of it for the cm adapter one isnt large enough for it to fit.

The board is designed kind of terribly, as why is the fpc connecter facing away from the other one.

20260621_075014
20260621_075014614×274 48.4 KB

11

Wait… I’m stupid, I think I got it in for both.

I never knew that you could install an FPC from the back of the slot!

1 Like
12

Okay, uconsole still doesn’t boot into the micro SD card.

Is there anyway I could flash some OS onto the SSD, like can I boot into Pi OS, then connect the SSD, while its on? As I want to flash Arch linux onto the SSD, then copy most of my home directory from my micro sd onto it

I have no devices other than the uconsole (now) that has an SSD slot, what should I do?

13

Yeah, neither did I. It took me a minute to figure that out for myself. :person_facepalming:

14

So I know that there are specific packages added to the OS image to make it work with the uConsole. Did you get the image from the community or the official repository?

15

Community. And it worked completely fine before the ssd upgrade.

How did your ssd upgrade go? Did u experience the same issues?

This might be to do with boot order. I might try take the ssd out later, and boot on micro sd like b4, and check boot order

16

Great progress!

I had a cheap NVMe USB dock at home which I used to write the image to the NVMe.

Maybe you can still do this without any other PC/NVMe dock.

  1. Boot into the SD card (without NVMe in)
  2. Edit the EEPROM to ignore NVMe.
  3. Reboot with NVMe installed
  4. Write the OS to NVMe with SD card copier
  5. Restore EEPROM to try NVMe boot again (important :grin:)
  6. Reboot again without SD card.
  7. Win?
17

Thanks. I can’t order a usb to nvme thing as I will be going on a trip for a month soon.

18

Okay… we have a problem.

The uconsole isn’t even booting up anymore on SD alone, like when the SSD is taken out.

19

I think that it doesn’t work, as its continuingly trying to find an SSD, as the ssd slot is available.

Removing the ssd upgrade isn’t an option, as it was a pain getting it in the first place, I really need help…

20

I think you can edit the eeprom settings via the usb port on the adapter board