[Review] NOCTIGON K9.3 by Hank Wang

Damn, would of thought someone would test aux led functionality before shipping these.

For most of you guys with flashing devices probably not a big deal but this is an expensive light to have to buy something to fix it.

While my first K9.3 arrived in a blink of an eye, the second one seems to be going back and forth in Shanghai for two days now. :FACEPALM: I wonder what’s going on over there. FedEx still expects it to be delivered in Germany on January 21...yeah, sure. ^:)

2021-01-21 05:27, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-21 04:40, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-21 04:03, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-21 04:02, SHANGHAI CN, International shipment release - Export
2021-01-20 23:00, SHANGHAI CN, At local FedEx facility
2021-01-20 23:00, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-20 04:06, SHANGHAI CN, At local FedEx facility
2021-01-20 04:06, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-19 23:00, SHANGHAI CN, At local FedEx facility
2021-01-19 23:00, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-19 03:31, SHANGHAI CN, At local FedEx facility
2021-01-19 03:31, SHANGHAI CN, In transit
2021-01-19 00:58, SHANGHAI CN, International shipment release - Export
2021-01-18 20:55, SHANGHAI CN, Left FedEx origin facility
2021-01-18 15:36, SHANGHAI CN, Picked up
2021-01-18 00:30, Shipment information sent to FedEx

Well, I agree it’s a bit annoying to deal with software bugs. At least these can be fixed by using a flashing kit and an Android smartphone. Maybe Hank can offer his flashing kit for a reduced price to those who purchased the first batch of K9.3 (like he did with the more dangerous muggle mode software bug in the first batch of D4v2).

I am more disappointed by the mediocre workmanship (notches, scratches) of my K9.3. I did not expect this to happen with a $ 145 light.

Not an excuse, but I think Hank’s company is exhausted and overtaxed. It’s difficult to be as careful and ensure top quality when your working frantically to meet demand.

I hope they get a handle on it soon, or the business will dry up as quickly as it came.

I must admit the anodisation is to the usual flaky Noctigon standard lol

Wow,interesting

I have a feeling he is in this weird growth spot where he really needs more labor, but you have to train your unskilled workforce and it means quality missteps and takes time, but I have no doubt Hank will regain tight QC.

Yeah, that’s my impression too. That’s why I’ll look the other way for now.

Also, I did just receive another immaculately flawless D18 yesterday, so it’s not all doom and gloom.

No noticeable flaws on the 5-6 lights I have bought recently, except maybe a switch boot that is deformed, but I have extras.

Wow, per order numbers, Hank’s current workload is an average of about 70 orders a day. Presumably most of them are lights, not parts. That’s quite the workload.

Pretty impressive, that is a ton of revenue generation.

Hank sent me a message about this, so I investigated and fixed it. Weirdest bug I’ve seen in Anduril so far. Still not sure what exactly causes it, but it acts like a compiler bug or something. If I simply add some extra no-op instructions in the affected code path, the issue goes away.

It’s weird because it only affects the K9.3, even though the lockout and aux LED code is exactly the same on a bunch of other lights. Also weird because it goes directly from lockout to “off”, and there is no code path which does that any more. So that would suggest it’s rebooting, but it doesn’t do the boot-up blink. Also weird because a steady color works fine in the low or high modes, and every pattern (including blinking) works fine in disco / rainbow / voltage modes, but a single color blinking fails.

Updated builds:

I doubt it’s a compiler bug, since those are very rare in practice. I probably did something wrong… but I haven’t been able to figure out what. So I hope to give it a more proper fix if I can confirm what’s causing it. Would be helpful to build it pre-fix on other platforms, to check if the compiler version is relevant. The buggy version was built with gcc-avr 1:5.4.0+Atmel3.6.1-2 from Debian.

Also, code for the K9.3 is now available in the anduril2 branch.

am i right that the 2020-12-13 firmware version is affected by the “aux led single color blinking lockout bug”?

Yes, the issue wasn’t known or fixed until 2021-01.

I dunno, I received the Fireflies E12R a few days ago and I have nothing but troubles with the UI.
For some reason it seems to keep reverting back to the simple UI, switches back to stepped ramping, and the secondaries (even on low) are dimmer than the Emisar D4V2 I have (not sure if that`s because of the light or the UI though).
I wish there was a way to lock in the advanced UI to stop it from switching back to the Simple UI.
Gonna give it a few days just in case it`s my sausage fingers that`s causing the problem.

Fireflies has a new light? Interesting. I don’t know what they did with the code, since it doesn’t appear to be available. I suppose I’ll have to bug them about license compliance again. :frowning:

Four new lights actually. E12R, T9R, NOV-Mu and T1R. The latter one has not been seen in the wild(erness) yet but I asked Jacky to send me one for review. The 6A buckdriver is derived from Loneocean's Lume-1 driver and as far as I am informed Loneoceans made this custom driver for Fireflies. Not sure, if this information is of any help to sort the licensing issues, though.

https://www.ff-light.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=64

Not sold yet on this light. Seems overly complicated. Not saying I don’t like it.

D’oh?

If it doesn’t speak to you, don’t get one. It’s not something I would get, because it’s not a category of light I have a use for. I use wide “soup can” lights sometimes when I need many lumens for a long time, especially for photo lighting purposes or as a lantern. And I use “plunger” shape thrower lights sometimes when I need to see a long distance. But I don’t really see the appeal of a “plunger” shape flood light.

I would even use a soda can thrower (3×18650 is the best format I have ever used, but I would still use 3×21700, I guess). “Plunger” shaped floodlight is kind of ‘meh’ for me, too. Unless it is very special (still, not this one).