🚫 - Voice Assistant PE with 4 red LEDs not working

[mint wyvern]

Hi all, nice to meet you! I've joined today because a Voice Assistant PE that I received on day one from a translation team leader has stopped working today.

Problem:
The device shows 4 red LED and according to the troubleshooting guide, this is a fatal error and I should ask for an RMA.

Steps done until now:
I've tried with no avail to factory reset it and even reinstalling the firmware from a web browser (but I couldn't because the device isn't detected by the browser - Firefox, Google Chrome... - although it is shown in lsusb:

Bus 001 Device 015: ID 303a:1001 Espressif USB JTAG/serial debug unit

and it also binds to /dev/ttyACM0.

Next steps?
When asking my friend about where was it purchased, he's told me that it was bought at domadoo.fr through Nabu Casa, not him; so I have no way to ask for an automatic RMA.

Expected solution:
I'd expect either a way to properly restore the device to factory status or a way to request an RMA to the vendor, when the product was a gift from Nabu Casa to translation team contributors.

Did any of you happen to have the same issue with the device? Any advice?

Thank you all for your interest!

[fossil eagle]

You can try to submit a support ticket. But as it has been a gifted device (which has been given to a third person), I wouldn't expect too much.
https://support.nabucasa.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

Or try to flash the firmware in bootloader mode:
https://support.nabucasa.com/hc/en-us/articles/25800285426589-Reinstalling-the-firmware-on-Home-Assistant-Voice-Preview-Edition-from-bootloader-mode

[mint wyvern]

Thanks for the advice, I'll try it right away. I can't lose anything at this point.

[mint wyvern]

So I've followed the steps in the previous link and the 4 red LEDs keep showing. I think I've properly installed the factory firmware .bin file from GitHub Releases page:

• I've gone to https://github.com/esphome/home-assistant-voice-pe/releases/tag/25.12.4 and downloaded https://github.com/esphome/home-assistant-voice-pe/releases/download/25.12.4/ha-voice-8mb-esp32s3.factory.bin
• Then I've gone to https://web.esphome.io/
• I've onnected my VA with USB-C cable while pressing the central button and releasing it after some seconds --> No LEDs on as stated by the guide
• I've connected my device by selecting the USB JTAG/serial debug unit (/dev/ttyACMX)
• I've selected INSTALL and chosen the ha-voice-8mb-esp32s3.factory.bin
• After around 2 minutes, the installation process has finished. After unplugging and plugging it again, the 4 LEDs keep showing

I've also been able to access the Home Assistant Voice PE firmware installer through an incognito page and disabling my py.hole ad-blocker. After flashing the v25.12.4, the issue persists (4 red LEDs). The wizard runs me through the Wifi configuration and Home Assistant integration, but it fails with the error shared in the screenshot:

Voice Satellite setup
Entity not found

[mint wyvern]

Yeah, I already sent them a ticket in parallel before opening this thread. I'm waiting for their reply as well as an inquiry sent to the source shop.

[mint wyvern]

More information that might be useful:

• Through the firmware update page I've accessed to the console logs and it seems to complain about the microphone:

[12:34:24][D][light:090]: 'voice_assistant_leds' Setting:
[12:34:24][D][light:078]:   Brightness: 40%
[12:34:24][D][light:114]:   Red: 100%, Green: 100%, Blue: 100%
[12:34:24][D][esp32_ble:381]: Disabling
[12:34:27][D][micro_wake_word:357]: Starting wake word detection
[12:34:27][D][light:090]: 'voice_assistant_leds' Setting:
[12:34:27][D][light:078]:   Brightness: 40%
[12:34:27][D][light:114]:   Red: 100%, Green: 100%, Blue: 100%
[12:34:27][D][micro_wake_word:375]: State changed from STOPPED to STARTING
[12:34:27][D][micro_wake_word:259]: Inference task has started, attempting to allocate memory for buffers
[12:34:27][D][micro_wake_word:264]: Inference task is running
[12:34:27][D][micro_wake_word:375]: State changed from STARTING to DETECTING_WAKE_WORD
[12:34:27][D][ring_buffer:034][mww]: Created ring buffer with size 3840
[12:34:27][W][i2s_audio.microphone:446][mic_task]: Read error: ESP_ERR_TIMEOUT
[12:34:27][W][component:333][mic_task]: i2s_audio.microphone set Warning flag: unspecified
[12:35:07][I][safe_mode:042]: Boot seems successful; resetting boot loop counter
[12:35:07][D][esp32.preferences:149]: Writing 5 items: 3 cached, 2 written, 0 failed

[mint wyvern]

Device logs of two resets. Filtering by errors we find the following messages:

[12:51:30][E][voice_kit:026]: Communication with Voice Kit failed
[12:51:30][E][component:246]: voice_kit was marked as failed
[12:51:30][E][component:362]: voice_kit set Error flag: unspecified
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:021]: Set page 0 failed
[12:51:30][E][component:246]: aic3204.audio_dac was marked as failed
[12:51:30][E][component:362]: aic3204.audio_dac set Error flag: unspecified
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:164]: Writing volume failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:164]: Writing volume failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][aic3204:147]: Writing mute modes failed
[12:51:30][E][component:362][update_task]: http_request set Error flag: unspecified
[12:51:30][E][http_request.idf:064][update_task]: HTTP Request failed; Not connected to network
[12:51:30][E][http_request.update:052][update_task]: Failed to fetch manifest from https://firmware.esphome.io/home-assistant-voice-pe/home-assistant-voice/manifest.json
[12:51:30][E][component:362]: http_request.update set Error flag: Failed to fetch manifest
[12:51:31][E][component:188]:   voice_kit is marked FAILED: unspecified
[12:51:31][E][aic3204:114]: Communication failed
[12:51:31][E][component:188]:   aic3204.audio_dac is marked FAILED: unspecified
[12:51:31][E][component:379]: http_request cleared Error flag