Print Cancelled Alarm

Community Support
1

I just received my GF a week ago. I followed the step by step instructions carefully. It sits on a table about 10 feet from my WiFi router. Then, I attempted to make my first print. This hasn’t happened yet.
Looking at the app, it toggles back and forth from “centering” to “off line”. When in centering, it moves under the camera for about 30 seconds then to the left for about 30 more. After about 30 minutes the print button is active. As soon as I hit it, I get the print cancelled alarm. This has happened twice, the day I got it and 2 days later when I tried it again. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

2

There’s a list of troubleshooting steps here that might help to narrow down the first part of the problem: https://glowforge.com/support/topic/troubleshooting/stuck-calibrating

When you say “print cancelled alarm,” what exactly is happening? Is there an error message?

1 Like
3

I’m pretty sure that the problem is signal related. Although the GF is only about 10 feet away from my WiFi router AND in a direct line of sight (no walls), the GF still goes off line every couple of minutes. I’ve been through the WiFi troubleshooting guide several times.

4

Were you able to print using a cell phone wi-fi hotspot?

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5

Try a different 2.4 GHz channel.

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6

I’m sorry to hear you hit a snag. I extracted the logs from your Glowforge to investigate your report, and it looks like your unit is having trouble maintaining a stable connection to our servers. Connections are occurring multiple times within a ten minute period. This can definitely lead to calibration and printing trouble.

Though network-specific Wi-Fi challenges may occur for a number of different reasons, I have a few suggestions that may help:

  • Since Glowforge only uses the 2.4GHz frequency, a connection will be harder to establish and maintain on a crowded 2.4GHz network. Other devices using 2.4GHz, like cordless phones and microwaves, can cause interference and an unstable connection. You can consult your router settings to check the performance and traffic on your 2.4GHz network.
  • In your network settings, check the channel you’re using for the 2.4GHz band, as @Tom_A suggests. Trying a different channel may provide a more consistent connectio

If you’re still having trouble, there’s a test you can try that will help us narrow down the problem. If possible, could you please create a Wi-Fi hotspot with a cell phone and use that network to connect your Glowforge to Wi-Fi? This is a good way to rule out signal interference, since you can set your phone right on top of your Glowforge!

You can find instructions online to help you create a Wi-Fi hotspot using a cell phone. Make sure that you set it up to be a 2.4 GHz hotspot, since that is the frequency your Glowforge uses.

Once the Wi-Fi hotspot is broadcasting, you can connect to it by following these steps:

  1. Turn on your Glowforge.
  2. Wait 30 seconds. Then hold down the button for ten seconds until it glows teal.
  3. Navigate to setup.glowforge.com and follow the instructions on-screen. When prompted to connect your Glowforge to Wi-Fi, choose the hotspot you created.
  4. Once Wi-Fi setup is complete, go to app.glowforge.com and try a few prints.

Let us know how it goes.

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7

About suggestion 1, consulting my router settings, I don’t have a clue on how to do that. I’ll have to do some research on that. I do know that the GF is the 4th device that was connected to our WiFi since we just received a new router a few weeks ago. The other 3 have no problem maintaining a signal.
About suggestion 2, using a cell phone as a hot spot, that is not an option for me. I live in a cellular dead zone. I rarely get a signal. Without WiFi, my phone would be useless.

8

I’m so sorry you ran into trouble. It looks like your Glowforge is connected and you’ve been able to print since contacting us. That’s great!

I also looks like you’re having fewer connection problems.

Did you make some changes to your network that improved things?

9

I was able to print today. This is pretty cool when it works. I still have no idea how to access or change my network settings so I tried something else. I turned off our cell phones. When I counted WiFi usage earlier I forgot about Alexa, I was glad to turn her off. All I left on that uses WiFi was the GF and my tablet to access the app.

I was hoping to use the GF a lot to enhance my wood craft business but I’m not sure leaving our cell phones off for extended periods of time is worth it. Since we live in a cellular dead zone, we rely on WiFi for our phone service.

If I can’t get this working soon without disabling our phones, it will be useless to me.

(Later that day)

On second thought, it seems that I just got lucky again this afternoon when I turned our phones off.

I was able to print a ruler on Saturday morning around 3am then nothing. Today, after I had turned everything off, I printed a scanned picture and the pencil box. I just tried the same routine of turning things off a few minutes ago and it kept going offline again. There is nothing else I can shut off to free up my WiFi signal

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10

I see you already emailed us about this and we’re working on it there, so I’m going to close this topic.