Flashing Red LED & SD Card Troubles

Hi, I'm very new to this forum, and to saber-building in general, and have come across an issue with mu build.

After about half a year of working on it in my spare time, I have all the electronics assembled (but not stuffed into the hilt yet) for my first saber. It has a CFX board, momentary switches for both main and aux., a single 18650 3.3v rechargeable battery, recharge-port with kill key, speaker, and a lightly modified led module from ultrasabers (sunriders destiny). However, when trying to start it up, there are issues. With the battery connected and sd card in, removing the kill key causes the little red light on the board (I think its called the diagnostic led?) to rapidly flash.

So real quick, here's what I've attempted so far:
-reboot, held the switches down while taking out kill key, led was red for about 5sec before going off (just as manual said), but as soon as switches were released, it went back to flashing
-voltage checks, everything reads as the volt-map says, save for the switches, no reading from either. Odd seeing as they seemed to trigger the reboot just fine. Maybe I have the meter's prongs in the wrong spot
-format sd card, used a sd card reader, formatted, downloaded up-to-date files, including the fw.dat (as a note, I have not added/modified any fonts)
-tried a usb connection to RICE on my pc. Rice, upon selecting the proper (and only) port, only rapidly flashes a message saying "sd failed, card not detected" (or something along those lines). (As a side, the RICE UI was really off from where the buttons actually are, had to randomly click around till I would see something respond)

I have seen some posts mention drivers, but I can't seem to find and up-to-date link to what they're referring to. I have also not tried recharging the battery yet, as I don't have a standalone charger for it, and I'm worried about using the saber's recharge port, given the issues its displayed.

At this point, I'm not so much looking for a definitive/immediate solution, I'd just be happy figuring out what the problem it. I'd assume it's the sd card/the board's ability to read it, but for all I know, one of you will tell me its actually a wiring issue or something else that I never would have thought of. Again, I'm new to a lot of this, and I've searched as much as I could for posts regarding similar issues, but to little avail.

Here are some simple pics of my board, not sure how much help they'll be:
Attachment 18099 Attachment 18100 Attachment 18101

Any information or help is greatly appreciated, even if it's just pointing me in a rough direction as to where I should start troubleshooting.

P.S. Apologies if this is the incorrect place to post this. If there is a more ideal location, I can delete this and repost accordingly.

The SD card has to be inserted for the board to work. You may have to reload the base SD card configuration from the Plecter Labs site, and reformat your SD card and put that setup on it.

Sorry, the photos were taken just for the sake of showing the wiring/soldering, and the sd card had been removed because it was not in use. To clarify, all attempts to activate the saber were done with the sd card in it's slot on the board and clicked into place.

Are the config files you mentioned different from the ones found here: https://www.plecterlabs.com/shop/art...?articles_id=4
Because those were the files I put on the sd card after I formatted it, as mentioned in the list of things I have tried.

Those are the ones, HOWEVER, you have to make sure the configs match the software version the card is flashed with.

Sorry, could you please elaborate on that? I need to make sure the config file(s) match the card's software version? Are you referring to the "rename_me" files you choose one of to make the config.txt? If I formatted the card, what determines the software version, the fw.dat I downloaded? Sorry to be so clueless on this matter.

The firmware that you have installed on the CFX determines the software version. For example: 10.006E is an older CFX Firmware version. Whatever configuration files you downloaded have to match the firmware version you currently have on your CFX. You should be able to use RICE to determine which Firmware version you have on your CFX.

I have reformatted and flashed the SD card, it now has matching software and firmware versions, with the appropriate files and configs renamed accordingly. Sadly, this has not provided any change. Even after holding the switches to trigger a reboot, which it seems to have executed, the red diagnostic led still just reverts to pulsating whenever the board has power. And it is still unable to connect to RICE, getting a "Init SD Failed - Insert valid SD card" message.

Still, thank you for explaining that stuff for me. Lord knows it would have just been another problem for me down the line, so its nice to nip it in the bud now.

You may just have a bad SD card, I’d get a different one and try that.

Update: So after finally getting a new sd card from the CSS, formatted and reinstalled the required software and firmware, sadly the same problem remains. I did, along with the new sd card, get a new CFX board, because at this point I feel like I may just have to start over.

The firmware gets installed onto the board. The fonts and configuration files are what is stored on the SD card.

The firmware is the fw.dat file right? I thought it got put onto the sd card, then once the card is inserted into the board, you reboot by holding the main and aux switches while taking out the kill-key? Is there a different reboot method of different way to load the firmware to the board? (Especially since rice isn't an option)

That is correct. I just wanted to make sure that is was actually installed onto the card. Just having it on the SD card doesn’t magically install it.

So, I haven't seen anything in the manual fully explaining it, but is there a known meaning for the different flashes of the red on-board led? Like I know it flashes slowly when you initiate a reboot, but does the medium-pace flashing mean something different to the rapid flashing, or are they both just a very general "something's wrong" indicator?

The continuous blinking / solid red means the board can’t read the card.