I just bought a brand new The Handy (FW4 beta 4.11+d4829e99) and used it only once. During the first use it suddenly stopped moving – piston got stuck at the top position, motor makes humming/vibrating sound but no actual movement at all.
I tried power cycling, long cooling periods (30–60 min), manual calibration (holding UP/DOWN buttons + gently pushing/pulling piston), and it temporarily moved again after cooling + recalibration. But after a short while it stopped again in the middle of use.
To fix the instability I decided to downgrade to stable FW3.2.3 final via the Handyverse website.
After the downgrade process finished, the device entered a boot loop:
LED flashes red-white alternately (start with multi colored earlier in the process then turned red/white)
No motor sound anymore
Device never fully boots (no green slow or purple steady light)
Tried WiFi button + power-on recovery mode multiple times → always ends up back at solid yellow light, never shows green-yellow alternation
Questions:
Has anyone had this exact red-white boot loop after downgrading FW4 beta → FW3.2.3? How did you fix it?
Did you have to wait longer (1+ hour) until it eventually booted?
Or did you have to send it for repair/replacement?
Any other recovery tricks besides WiFi + DOWN button method?
Thank you so much for any advice or similar experiences. I’m really hoping to get it working normally again soon.
I haven’t contacted support directly yet, but I’ve already sent the handy back to the reseller. They’ll handle the warranty claim for me, though it might take about 3-4 months
1.I have had the red white boot loop only because my device overheated and used Fw4beta when it was first new.
When it first over heated i just waited a day. After 24 hours I added sil-glide and used long tweezers to put the lube along the metal rod inside. I didn’t take the handy 1 apart but i just manually push the mechanism up and down to lube up the insides. I re lube it once every 6 months. Lube does dry out over time. I use the Handy on the regular. After i did plug it back in and the handy 1 acted as if I just turned it on for the first time.
This time the android app just had a huge update and different name. It used to be called The Handy. Now the app is called Handy Onboarding. Maybe I was lucky that it registered my handy 1 as a new device which got everything working just following the on screen app instructions.
Other than the WIFI + down method all I did was run the handy through the app again. On your first boot you need to connect via the app to setup the handy with bluetooth [handy shows blue light] to register your connection key. When your android app says connection successful. You can try your new connection key and switch the blue light to wifi mode which gives a pink light. Then do a test run with one of the provided apps to secure connection. The only other time when I saw the red light occur is when the script i’m using is too fast for the Handy 1 to handle to it throws out a red and white light color.I assumed my handy is overheating. Since I made my handy a hands free device i touch it and yea it overheated so I turn it off and do something else.
The newest revision of Fw4 i currently don’t have issues with it. I have a successful connection everytime. It was only the 1st revision of fw4 i had major lag. it would take 30 seconds to connect as suppose to 6 seconds before on FW3.2.3. Now I only wait 2 seconds at most to connect to scriptPlayer and Intiface with the latest version of FW4.
That device you purchased or just received in the mail sounds already broken especially after using it one time. Your package most likely got smashed during the delivery I have never heard of humming or vibrating.
Thanks for your advice! Just wanted to update: I received a replacement device, and it’s running FW3.2.3 now. I’m not planning to upgrade to FW4 anymore, and it’s working perfectly fine so far - no problems at all."