Banana Pi not booting (red LED on)

Question

I got some brand new banana Pi's, these are the "Banana Pi-M2" and the "Banana Pi-M3"

I was trying to install Debian on both of them, but I couldn't get it to work. I was exactly following this tutorial here (Windows): http://wiki.lemaker.org/BananaPro/Pi:SD_card_installation to save Debian on the SD Card.

The Problem is always the same. When pressing the power Button on the "M3", or plugging in the "M2", only the red LED goes on and nothing happens.

The LED for the LAN port stays off, so it comes close that the Pi is not booting up.

The power supply I am using produces 5V and 2100mA which should fit the conditions for the Banana Pi.

The distros I then tried to install were for example Bananian which I got from here: https://www.bananian.org/download

And several distros like Debian from here: http://www.banana-pi.org/m3-download.html http://www.banana-pi.org/m2-download.html

I tested it using 2 different SD Cards, and also only using a USB Stick. everything was producing the same error. Is there something I missed?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

It sounds like an underpowering situation.

If you have a barrel jack instead of micro usb use the barrel jack.

The pre-production samples of this board had the usual 4.0/1.7mm barrel jack for DC-IN BPi M2/M2+ also use. This has been replaced by a Micro USB jack on the first production batch in Dec 2015 leading to the usual sorts of problems banana-pi.org forums are full of (see also next paragraph for some reasons). Starting in May 2016 Micro USB has been replaced by the 4.0/1.7mm barrel jack again so powering is possible more reliable now. The Micro USB receptacle on the longer board side is USB OTG, also connected to the board's PMIC and while looking like an alternative way to power the board that's not recommended unless you love underpowering situations, reboot loops and the like.