Box does not recognize Tonies at all

Hi everybody. Before modding the boxes of my kids, I bought a “defective” one from the german craigslist.

One problem was a non-working battery => that was a quick fix.

The other is not quite documented in any FAQ. The box does not answer to anything put on it.

I did a complete hard reset and wanted to get started by doing a “regular” setup. That went great up to the point of actualy putting an official tonie-figure. Nothing at all - no flashing lights - no Errorcode, because of the “Offline”-Mode.

As the other Audio is working fine (Ears and On/Off-Audio Jinge, as well, as the setup) I am quite sure it is no audio jack issue.

I was thinking of a quick fix replacing the antena, but came to know that the spare part is not quite available. So I did some digging and found a simmilar issue in the forums here. But it was not quite the same after looking deeper. I even did use my Multimeter to check the Antena Ohm-Wise like described here:

This also looks great. Then I tried using -50°C spray to freeze the trf7962a chip and its surrounding to check for a possible short when turning on the box… Nothing => could be dead completely or working fine. Schödingers-trf7962a for now.

Does anybody have any suggestions before I go nuts? :slight_smile:

Thank you in advance

Check the crystal

How to? I have no oscilloscope and know no one who could help me with that.

Your multimeter may have a frequency / xtal function to check the crystal.

Oh yes, you are right. I completely forgot about it. Should I probe against the black wire from the battery pack? Or is another Pin more sufficient?

Thank you!

The legs on my Battery Connector are free, so I put the black probe of my multimeter there. Then with the red probe I tried both legs of X3 and after that X2. Both did nothing for me. I tried it again with a connected antenna. I did both with a connected battery and flashing green light. No readings at all…

Then I thought about my approach and connected the power adapter and took ground from there.

I got funny readings from that. As soon as i put the “black” probe against the power socket-ground (I assume it is the outer 4 legs of the socket) every second - as I have a cheap multimeter, I guess - the reading changes from some Hz to 1.something kHz.

Any Idea what I am doing wrong? (Sorry, this is more general electronics questions, than toniebox specific, I guess.

This sounds similar to an issue I’ve had. For me it was the 5V for the RFID IC was not created properly. I’ve replaced the IC with this one https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/texas-instruments/TPS61070DDCR/665930 and it worked. I also have two of them left and since I’m also from germany I can send it to you if you discover that you also don’t have the 5V for the RFID IC. It is the six pin IC next to C322.