Sigh
Okay… So round about half a year ago already I broke my touchscreens USB-C plug off while trying to lift the enclosure of the machine. It was a stupid accident and I could have avoided it, had I thought of unplugging the touchscreen before trying to lift the enclosure of. But it is what it is.
So I wrote snapmaker hoping for help or accommodation but the only thing they could offer was to send a new touchscreen for 200€ plus shipping and that still makes me kinda angry as it’s just the stupid USB-C connector and the touchscreen is fine otherwise and it’s just such a waste to toss the entire screen out because of one tiny circuit board that would probably cost 80ct to replace.
I hesitated and after a few month I wrote them again asking for any other solution, that I could solder it myself if they just send me a new circuit board or that I can bring it to an official seller to get it replaced but they said they don’t even manufacture the touchscreen themselves and have no contact to the manufacturer so they cannot send parts, cannot repair it and cannot help any other way than selling me a new one.
They send me a picture of an opened cable just like I had posted in the fb group already and said I could try a normal USB-C connector from Amazon or whatever.
Month went by again I could not get help in the group, I tried finding connectors with the right amount of ports but nothing until one day on aliexpress I saw one that had at least enough ports to eventually fit… But it has too many ports as I am realising now… It has 8 on each side while the original one has 6 on the one side and 7 on the other…
Again month went by and finally the connector was delivered and now I am trying to figure out how to solder it to the old cables - it’s kind of a guessing game and the more I look at it the more I think there’s no use putting all this effort into it as I cannot even read the descriptions on the ports correctly and the circuit board I got looks nothing like the original one…
Long story short - does anyone know enough about these type of circuit boards to have a guess what needs to go where? I made a spreadsheet with the old connections and colors I saw on the old circuit
I don’t understand what you mean, what should I cut? How would I test? Did you take a look at the photos I provided? Especially the last 3 pictures show the new and old connector and the previous ones the open cable
Sorry, I didn’t see that there were more pictures to it.
Basically you get the standard USB3 pinout from Wikipedia:
However, it looks like Snapmaker is using a non-standard pinout here. E.g. I know of no FG pin in USB3. That means you need to test with a voltmeter which wire (cable side) belongs to which pin (connector side) to match the Snapmaker pinout. Some pins may be bridged. If you match the pin to wire in the same way as Snapmaker does it should work. However, I recommend to check each pin to wire connection of the original connector also regarding its resistance. E.g. the CC pins of USB3 can be pulled down with 5.1kΩ to emulate a USB2.0 device. These may be already included in the original or your new connector.
I understood that the original connector broke and there is no wire compatible replacement. Therefore, he can only solder a new connector to the touch screen cable. I think it uses a standard USB-C connector, so any one would do. Just the pin to wire mapping remains unknown. But with a voltmeter he should be able to figure that out.
I would love to, if you have a broken Touchscreen that I could source that cable from the issue is as dstarke said that my connector broke entirely (see photos)
But unlike what dstarke says, I am by now kind of certain (from reading similar reports on the forum here) that no matter what I do, I won’t be able to make this work with a replacement connector of any kind in another thread, @Edwin offered another user with the same problem a new cable instead of them having to purchase an entire screen - so maybe that could work but otherwise it seems the USB-C connector circuit is very much specialized and this cannot be replaced with a normal store bought USB-c connector
The TouchPad cable is NOT USB-C. It is a pin-to-pin pass through cable that just happens to use a USB-C style connector. That is why the majority of USB-C cable extenders do not work to extend the TouchPad cable. You need a straight pass-through cable for an extender. Most USB-C cables have electronics built into the connector molding, which makes them unsuitable for use here.
you write again to the support and ask for a connection cable from the controller to the TouchPad completely.
Since the cable is still in order on the TouchPad, you can solder the wire assignment again as it is in the TouchPad. (if that is possible and not too minimalistic).
you open a new thread here and ask if someone here has an old defective TouchPad, but where the cable is still in order and you replace it with this cable.
I know this is a high price, but keep in mind that if you make a mistake soldering the wires, it can in the worst case destroy your controller and possibly other parts.
And whether you want to spend hundreds of euros to get your machine running again, I think it is rather pointless!
The USB-C connector adapter PCB he bought on AliExpress most likely has no such built in circuit. These are intended for DIY projects where you add such circuits yourself. So I believe it is doable. But he needs to double check that for the bought one. From the pictures I would assume that the connector from Snapmaker has no additional logic added. Just the mapping remains unknown.
Well on could fit and so, I do not know if I would rely on it !?.
Auser Snapmaker or the subcontractor can send him the Pinout.
Otherwise, the risk of destroying something else with me would be much too high.
I also solder and also SMD but only one wire wrong and then cause even higher costs if the TouchPad then works again at all.
Feasible is everything but the question is at what price?
I agree with @dstarke. This is not complicated. People use passive extenders all the time, splice it on. I also found similar usbc connectors with PCB pinouts online, that would be even easier. Adafruit and Amazon have some. Cut the flanges of this PCB for example
This is a USB extension cable that I bought from Amazon in order to relocate my touchscreen, everything works great and this could be an option for you to cut and splice it to your broken cable.
Thanks Andy but it’s not the cable that’s broken, but the plug itself
And just like with all the other options here I would end up with a lot of cables of different color, if I was to slice up that extension cord you send, and I won’t know which cable to attach to which, coming from the touchscreen
Cut broken connector off on touchscreen cable. Cut good end off extension. Splice.
Then your only option is to purchase a new touchscreen if you can’t be confident of the wiring. Cable colors get beeped out with an ohmmeter and never innately trusted generally.
It’s not “easy” but it is fairly straightforward to do the investigation of the wiring of both the broken connector and the extension connector and develop a map between them. Short of that, you must purchase an entire touchscreen as there’s no other way than just “guessing”.
I don’t understand what you mean. There’s 11 cables of different color inside the the cable coming from the touchscreen and since it’s a custom made chip and a custom made cable, these aren’t going to be the same cable colors as inside that Amazon cable besides that the Amazon cable is likely going to have at least 18 cables inside
So mix and match I guess? Just try all combinations?
the issue is as dstarke said that my connector broke entirely (see photos)
that was obviously sarcasm.