C-more Micro HMI Enable the Setup Screen (F1/F5) from AutomationDirect

Normally if you press both the F1 and F5 keys for 3 seconds, you get the setup screen. We can simulate that here by right clicking and selecting Go To Setup Menu. And there is our setup menu. You have to be in this menu in order to program the panel using the serial cables. IF for some reason you can’t access that setup screen - I can force that by pressing this button - now pressing both function keys F1 and F5 at the same time for 3 seconds (I’ll simulate that here) doesn’t bring up the setup screen. No matter how hard I try, I can’t get into the setup menu. So the issue here is that the project that is currently loaded into the c-more micro has probably turned off the setup screen. This project is setup to do it with this pushbutton, but what if a project inadvertently disabled the setup screen? How are you going to get back into the setup screen so you can program the C-More Micro? There’s a whole video on How To prevent access to the setup screen that you can watch for tips and tricks on how to take advantage of that, but, in a nutshell … there is an internal TAG in the C-More Micro that the project can set to disable the setup screen – which is exactly what this pushbutton is doing – this pushbutton is modifying this internal TAG – this SYS DISABLE USE F!+F5 SETUP tag – When that value is ON, I cannot access the setup menu screen. When that value is OFF, then I can access the setup menu. The problem is, if that TAG IS enabled, and the program doesn’t provide a way to disable it, then you can’t load a new program via the serial port because programming requires that the panel be in the setup screen mode (This doesn’t apply to USB programming – USB programming automatically puts the panel in Setup Mode). So … If the program doesn’t provide for a means to disable that special TAG, then your only way back in is to reset the panel to factory default Fortunately, it’s easy - Just hold down F2 and F4 at the same time while applying power. The panel may ask you to calibrate the screen, then you will find yourself at the setup screen and can now load a new program into the panel. A word of caution – you will lose all contents of the panel when you go back to factory default, so make sure that is what you want to do. That’s all there is to regaining access to the setup screen – be sure to check out the other videos in this series. And as always, please send us any topics you would like to see covered – or - any other comments for that matter – we appreciate the feedback