Wiki Consolidated eMMC Thread (MCU repair) (Black Center Screen)

[Akikiki]

@Ron Burgundy, here's a little test you can do. Remember with MCU1 that the upper buttons on the wheel, would reboot the IC? Will not now with MCU2. The scroll wheels on the steering wheel, still reboot the Center screen, but also now, reboot the IC2. Try it.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

@Ron Burgundy, here's a little test you can do. Remember with MCU1 that the upper buttons on the wheel, would reboot the IC? Will not now with MCU2. The scroll wheels on the steering wheel, still reboot the Center screen, but also now, reboot the IC2. Try it.

Thanks @Akikiki! That makes sense.
Good to hear from you again!

 

[Flaminis]

We know that scheduled charging can be stopped by an eMMC failure. As you know scheduled charging uses the location to begin charging. We've encouraged people with a marginal or failing or suspiciously behaving eMMC to do two things.
1. Remove scheduled charging for a while. A while could be until eMMC is replaced or the car's behavior improves
2. Disable/remove PIN to Drive, because if the screen goes blank, you are not going to be able to type in the PIN.

1. Scheduled charging in the event of an emmz malfunction does not affect the charge rate in any way from the word "completely" - the gateway and all units remain in normal operation, regardless of the operability of the tegra board
2. If it is impossible to enter pin to drive, the Tesla uses a backup program that allows you to start systems without entering a code.

 

[mikemillar]

Homelink to my Seip universal receiver and bluetooth to phone have worked perfectly for 7 years on my 2015 Model S. I recently had tyres replaced and Tesla offered a free VCM replacement to upgrade eMMC - well it was free so why not? - BIG MISTAKE! Homelink wouldn't work when I arrived home. Couldn't re-program. Tesla claim the upgrade hasn't affected Homelink. We have now checked to output fromn the MS with a spectrum analyser and it is transmitting on the same frequency as the key fobe transmitter (about 434mHz). Suspect the security coding has been upgraded (rolling code?) and won't work with older receivers.

NOW - I discover that the Bluetooth phone connection isn't working either! I only found this out some time later when I tried to make a phone call. Deleted the phoner and tried to reconnect. MS can see the phone but connection fails. There seem to be a number of threads about Bluetooth connection problems.

I am about to check out the Homelink on the garage door of a friend with a recent Tesla, as advised by Tesla, but have yet to attempt to communicate the Bluetooth problem to a real person at Tesla - book yet another abortive service appointment!

Could igt be that the eMMC upgrade they just installed is faulty as hinted in this thread?

It could be the beginning of eMMC problems for your car. That's why you need to watch from the list for anything else. You might not see any new or a different problem until your second update from now. Its going to take some reading to understand. But I will try to give you a short version. I did eMMC failure tracking for S/Xs reported on TM and TMC for 15-16 months. Gathers some interesting info. Most common failure was 2015 cars.

The eMMC is storage. The firmware is stored on two firmware partitions on the eMMC. One is active where your car reads the code from to start each time or each time its rebooted. The other partition is inactive and currently holds the last firmware update - something you had before 2020.48.37.1. The active partition flips/flops between the to active and inactive partitions as one becomes the current with the latest firmware.

Your current .48.37.1 could be sitting on eMMC bad spots where the code (sound stuff) can't be completetly read from. Its likely to stay that way until you get another OTA let's call this one .38.0 . When it downloads and installs, is going to make that inactive partition active and reboot the car. When it does the firmware will not be in exactly the same place on the (inactive now) soon to be active partition. So, sound stuff could be (likely be) a different location and the car can read the code okay, and it works. But code could deliver to some other bad spot and something else might not work. So an OTA (38.0) could fix your problem. But that also means, the next OTA let's call this one 39.0, could break something else. Because now you have circled back to the same partition with this 39.0 install that you had the sound problem. Unlikely that sound stuff would deliver to the same place that it was way back with 37.1. So same bad spot are there, but some other code is in that spot and something different doesn't work.

Not the best explanation, but I am running out of time before I have to be somewhere. Sorry. Hope you get a basic idea. A different problem could occur after your next update. And if the problem is your eMMC, this problem is not going to get better with time. In fact, it will get worse with time.

 

[HankLloydRight]

I doubt the new eMMC is faulty.
Sounds more like they forgot to re-connect an antenna or two or a harness is not fully seated.

 

[scaesare]

Just popping in to say that after having replaced my own eMMC ~3 yrs ago[1], with the recent 3G cell shutdown and the fact that my MCU and dash screens were melting I decided to just do the Intel MCU replacement.

Because I had incurred expense for the eMMC replacement that Tesla had never responded to my reimbursement request about[2], they threw in the FM Tuner for free.


[1] Never reinstalled the dash trim as I was figuring out what to do about the screens... and then the pandemic hit... hence my wife calling it my Ghetto Tesla for the last couple years lol

[2] Service tech had never heard of this program, and was suprised when I forwarded the email from Tesla Corporate

 

[mikemillar]

I doubt the new eMMC is faulty.
Sounds more like they forgot to re-connect an antenna or two or a harness is not fully seated.

Yes, could be any one of a number of things I guess

 

[FlatSix911]

Just popping in to say that after having replaced my own eMMC ~3 yrs ago[1], with the recent 3G cell shutdown and the fact that my MCU and dash screens were melting I decided to just do the Intel MCU replacement.

Because I had incurred expense for the eMMC replacement that Tesla had never responded to my reimbursement request about[2], they threw in the FM Tuner for free.
[1] Never reinstalled the dash trim as I was figuring out what to do about the screens... and then the pandemic hit... hence my wife calling it my Ghetto Tesla for the last couple years lol
[2] Service tech had never heard of this program, and was suprised when I forwarded the email from Tesla Corporate

Good to know... what was the total cost?

 

[scaesare]

Good to know... what was the total cost?

$1500 + tax incl. labor

Picked it up yesterday, and have only driven it for 15 minutes thus far, but responsiveness is vastly improved, and no more melting screens dripping goop in to my center console is greatly welcomed. The additional software features (additional media options, charging management, games, etc...) are a nice bonus.

I did lose my profile & settings, so had to re-program homelink, re-select radio favorites, recreate seating profiles, lost trip counters, etc..

 

[Krash]

I just had the service center eMMC upgrade on MCU1. Can anyone confirm if while you are playing older games, while also listening to media, can you still use the steering wheel to adjust volume or skip tracks? I cannot.

Anyone remember those steering wheel functions working on earlier builds? You can still use the app API over cellular.

Browser is still not responsive. And ICU reboots more frequently, but I’m happy to eek a few more years out of MCU1 while I am waiting for one of you to hack cooling for a MCU3/Z retrofit.

 

[FlatSix911]

I just had the service center eMMC upgrade on MCU1. Can anyone confirm if while you are playing older games, while also listening to media, can you still use the steering wheel to adjust volume or skip tracks? I cannot.

Anyone remember those steering wheel functions working on earlier builds? You can still use the app API over cellular.

Browser is still not responsive. And ICU reboots more frequently, but I’m happy to eek a few more years out of MCU1 while I am waiting for one of you to hack cooling for a MCU3/Z retrofit.

You may want to consider the MCU2 retrofit... it really restores the responsiveness of the media functions to like-new conditions.

 

[pki79]

Homelink to my Seip universal receiver and bluetooth to phone have worked perfectly for 7 years on my 2015 Model S. I recently had tyres replaced and Tesla offered a free VCM replacement to upgrade eMMC - well it was free so why not? - BIG MISTAKE! Homelink wouldn't work when I arrived home. Couldn't re-program. Tesla claim the upgrade hasn't affected Homelink. We have now checked to output fromn the MS with a spectrum analyser and it is transmitting on the same frequency as the key fobe transmitter (about 434mHz). Suspect the security coding has been upgraded (rolling code?) and won't work with older receivers.

NOW - I discover that the Bluetooth phone connection isn't working either! I only found this out some time later when I tried to make a phone call. Deleted the phoner and tried to reconnect. MS can see the phone but connection fails. There seem to be a number of threads about Bluetooth connection problems.

I am about to check out the Homelink on the garage door of a friend with a recent Tesla, as advised by Tesla, but have yet to attempt to communicate the Bluetooth problem to a real person at Tesla - book yet another abortive service appointment!

Could igt be that the eMMC upgrade they just installed is faulty as hinted in this thread?

At the time my eMMC was faulty i also had the problem that i could not connect a new phone, could not delete old phone, so it can be a file system issue.

 

[Akikiki]

You may want to consider the MCU2 retrofit... it really restores the responsiveness of the media functions to like-new conditions.

I agree, but there's no one on TMC or owns a Tesla that already knows better than @Krash the benefits of MCU2 over MCU1. Believe me, please. He knows.

 

[TonyT]

If your seeing werid issues after eMMC upgrade, try a few factory resets over a few days. Once a day for 4 days seems to resolve many of the issues of corrupted data migrated during the replacement. @mikemillar

 

[KalJoMoS]

I just had the service center eMMC upgrade on MCU1. Can anyone confirm if while you are playing older games, while also listening to media, can you still use the steering wheel to adjust volume or skip tracks? I cannot.

Mine is the same, if you have the entertainment app open to play the games then if needed to adjust volume it’s not responding. It’s still original eMMC on 2016 car.

 

[mikemillar]

Thanks pki79, Akikiki, TonyT - I'll try serval factory resets, at least that's someting I can do myself.

 

[mikemillar]

PS - By 'factory reset' are we talking about a soft reset - by pressing both scroll wheels on my 2015 Model S - or a hard reset, which seems to involve disconnecting the 12Volt battey as described by this rather useful blog on the subject

Tesla MCU1 eMMC Failure Explained

What is the Tesla eMMC failure? How does this affect recalls? Will Tesla upgrade MCU1 to MCU2 for free? Find out now!

www.findmyelectric.com

The former, I hope - hard reset sounds rather intimidating for the average owner!

 

[scaesare]

PS - By 'factory reset' are we talking about a soft reset - by pressing both scroll wheels on my 2015 Model S - or a hard reset, which seems to involve disconnecting the 12Volt battey as described by this rather useful blog on the subject

Tesla MCU1 eMMC Failure Explained

What is the Tesla eMMC failure? How does this affect recalls? Will Tesla upgrade MCU1 to MCU2 for free? Find out now!

www.findmyelectric.com

The former, I hope - hard reset sounds rather intimidating for the average owner!

You can also do an MCU "power-off" hard reset by pulling it's fuse... much easier than getting to the original battery location. On my 2013, it's F51 (circled), but you may need to confirm that didn't change for your 2015:

 

[mikemillar]

PPS - Just tried another scroll wheel reset - not the first since this problem arrose - and.... lo and behold, my iphone now connects! Haven't tried the Homelink yet, but this is looking more promising. Many thanks for your good advice, TonyT

 

[brkaus]

I thought he was referring to the menu option to remove all the settings. Like when selling the car. But not sure.