New Max Ent dead with no status lights

We have a new (purchased in February but not used until now) Pep Max Br1 Ent LTEA. We powered it up in June and did an initial configuration, but then put in on the shelf as a spare. Last week we decided fire it up again prior to putting it into production. Unfortunately,
neither status nor cellular lights ever came on. There was no usual “blink” of the ethernet port lights when power is first applied. I swapped power supplies and tested voltage of both power supply as 12.1 volts. One of the power supplies is an original Peplink unit. The other is from some other equipment but with identical specs.I have used both power supplies interchangeably on other Pep units. I was working on a APC UPS in good shape. The Ent unit got warm after some time, say 20 minutes, but there was no other evidence of life.I made at least a dozen tries at powering it up, and finally opened a support ticket.

The next day, I decided to try again. This time, same power supply, same everything, the unit powered up normally and acquired cellular signal, all perfect. I have been cycling the power from time to time now for several days with no repetition the earlier comatose state.

I updated my support ticket and they offered to leave my ticket open for another week to see if the behavior returns. So far it has not and my week is about up.

Should I be happy? The only thing worse, IMHO, than broken equipment is equipment that is broken sometimes. This is brand new hardware. I was hoping for better from Pep. My situation is complicated by being in a remote corner of Africa where it is really difficult get gear in and out. I am now trying to decide whether to go ahead and put the Ent unit in production and pretend this didn’t happen. My current production unit is a Max BR1 that is now almost five years old. It is having no problems and will become my spare when/if I put in the new Ent.

A friend suggested I do a factory reset. That is a good suggestion, worth trying… but if I can’t reproduce the issue, there really isn’t to learn by making good tries. That is why "broken sometimes’ is so very painful.

I would be grateful for the group’s opinion.

Thanks in advance,

Steve Pence
IT Support
SIL Tanzania

Use a voltmeter to measure power output of your power source

Hi Steve,

I would test the device in different temperature states. Maybe you can reproduce the error if it’s to cold or to warm.

Regards
Dennis

As mentioned in my post, I tested both power supplies. They both tested 12.1 volts. I have a good Fluke meter.

Steve.