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Tim Chapman avatar image
Tim Chapman asked

Cannot access Venus GX

My Venus GX is regularly, but not permanently connected to the internet and up until now has updated its own firmware automatically without my intervention. Today when I looked at the remote console I could see the message ‘installing firmware 2.30’, or something similar. This message never went away so I went to the menu option to revert to the original firmware. Now I can’t access the unit at all. The WiFi in the unit is disabled and the fixed IP address that I set for the unit, connected to the LAN, does not respond to a ping.

How can regain access to the unit?

Venus GX - VGX
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imv avatar image
imv answered ·

We also seem to be having problems with remote monitoring on the VRM which we think may possible be related to the V2.30 update. We monitor a large number of installations to which we have lost communication with.

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Paul B avatar image
Paul B answered ·

Hi tim, if the orginal firmware had the wifi disabled then try this

the ip address of the venus at default I think is 172.24.24.1 s


set your computers network adapters port ip to 172.168.0.50 subnet mask to 255.255.255.0 no gateway needed, then connect the computer to the network port on the venus and see if you can connect using the browser to ip 172.168.0.1


I have done this using the wifi myself but I have not done it using the network port or hard wired cable


worth a try


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Tim Chapman avatar image Tim Chapman commented ·

This doesn’t help unfortunately. The unit is not accessible in any way. I really need to factory reset it but can’t find any documentation on how to do this.

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Paul B avatar image
Paul B answered ·

there are some posts about the venus GX re doing a factory reset so have search on the forum and you should find it

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Tim Chapman avatar image Tim Chapman commented ·

Although I have located what appears to be a reset button on unit I haven’t been able to find anything in this forum which explains how to use it.

The manual refers to this button and says ‘see previous chapter’ but there is no relevant previous chapter.

I tried pressing the reset button, then I tried holding it down for a period of time and then I tried applying power with the button held down. None of these things seem to work.

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Paul B avatar image
Paul B answered ·

This may not be of much help but this post is how it was done by this person

I myself have also tried the reset button but that did not seem to work for me but I did get back in using the wifi, but it looks like you have disabled that.


maybe Victron has a better idea for you

https://community.victronenergy.com/questions/18359/venus-not-reachable-mistake-modifying-etcdbus-1sys.html

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mvader (Victron Energy) avatar image
mvader (Victron Energy) answered ·

Hi Tim, I'm sorry about this. I think the most straight forward solution is to contact your dealer for a replacement.


There is no 'reset to factory default' option in the unit. For more details, see this chapter in the manual:

https://www.victronenergy.com/live/venus-gx:start#factory_reset


(I added it just now; I'll review it later today).

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Tim Chapman avatar image Tim Chapman commented ·

Thanks for the reply and also for writing the update to the manual. Unfortunately all efforts to connect to the device fail. In addition my Digital Multi Control now shows strange behaviour when the Venus GX is connected to the VE Bus.

As I’m sailing half way across the Pacific Ocean contacting a dealer isn’t going to be possible until I get to New Zealand in November.

A take away from this is to never allow automatic firmware updates, particularly when there is no option to reset..

Thanks again for trying to help.

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Tim Chapman avatar image Tim Chapman commented ·

I just read in a Victron blog that a robust internet connection is required. I would imagine that many of these devices are installed on boats, as mine is, and regularly have weak and sporadic internet connections. My understanding is that the data is buffered to the SD card until a suitable connection is available at which time it is uploaded to VRM. This is how my unit has behaved up until recently.

This is the first time I have seen mention of a robust internet connection and I feel that should be mentioned that anyone installing these units on boats should be advised to turn automatic updates off. I have just been quoted 8 weeks or more from a South Pacific dealer to resolve my issue. This is an impossible situation for me and I will probably be without the Venus I paid for for over 6 month so before I can get it reset.

If there isn’t any way that the Venus could be reset by the end user please contact me and assist. Thank you.

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mvader (Victron Energy) avatar image mvader (Victron Energy) ♦♦ Tim Chapman commented ·

Hi Tim, what blog post did you read? For sending data to VRM, there is no robust connection required at all.

See CCGX manual, chapter 5. https://www.victronenergy.com/live/ccgx:start#vrm_portal

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