hoping for help on my fitbit blaze

[penalozapat]

hello! i am hoping for some help on my fitbit blaze.

yesterday, in the middle of a timer - the screen went black.

the green light comes and goes...

as of right now - the green light is on, the screen is still black. i am connected to my phone and still receive notifications/buzzes on my watch - but obviously cannot see it. It is still tracking my steps and heart rate.. but does not seem to be responsive to charging.

I have attempted to press the left button simultaneously with the bottom right and received a "buzz" and a lighter colored black screen - but still no luck.

any advice? i am using the most current App in IOS and have version 8.402.1 on my fitbit. i do not see any place to click "update now" so i believe i have the most recent firmware. 

thanks in advance.

[RickJay]

Hi Penalozapat,

Sorry to hear of your problem. Is your Blaze still under warranty? If so, you should probably wait until you hear official word from the Fitbit crew before attempting my suggestion.

In my opinion, there is a design flaw in the Fitbit Blaze in that it has no provision to do a hard reset. (I'm guessing their other products are the same, but I'd love to hear differently.) The first and foremost way to fix ANY computer problem is to "shut it off and turn it back on again". (Watch an episode of the first season of "The IT Crowd", or search for it on YouTube.)  Seriously, though, that would be my suggestion, Unfortunately, you can't do that with the Blaze UNLESS you're willing to open it up, do a bit of micro-surgery and soldering. Such a reset MIGHT bring your Fitbit display back to life. Like I said, that is the normal way to regain control of any errant computer. The programmers & engineers at Fitbit, however, either skipped class that day or were pressured by the bean counters and took the cheap way out! Sorry, as an engineer, I abhor bad engineering design!

If you read posts 36 & 37 in this thread: https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Blaze/Temperature-symbol-on-display/td-p/2437699/page/2, we explain a bit about the process, and there are videos on the web about how to replace a battery in the Fitbit Blaze. You don't have to replace the battery, just disconnect it for a short time.

I can't say that will work, but I can guarantee that the experts at Fitbit would recommend a hard reset...IF they designed it to do as such.

Good Luck,

~Rick

[penalozapat]

thank you so much for your reply. Hopefully i can get another answer before i perform surgery on it! thanks again for the detailed replay and beyond helpful knowledge and links.

[MarkMM]

Have you held the left and bottom right buttons to do a restart? Some recommend doing this several times repeatedly. 

[penalozapat]

thank you!

i have done this quite a few times and get a small "buzz" on occasion. The green light comes and goes still and there seems to be a back light that comes on, but very dim and nothing else appears. i read somewhere to restart, wait for the buzz, and place on charger - have had no success with that attempt 😞