I was unfortunate and interrupted a firmware update and had to go through the recovery procedure described in “Pedal does not power on”. It worked as described, just took a while to download, install, and create the recovery card. It did take a bit of searching to find the article so perhaps some improved documentation like a troubleshooting flow diagram or something like that posted along with the rest of the pedal documentation would be helpful.
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I had this same issue recently and using a Mac, it did not work. I was able to find a Windows PC and perform the steps with success. $0.02
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Bonkers alright. Assumed I somehow zapped the unit until I opened it up and saw the green light. Got it fixed via this procedure but I think there must be a problem with the upgrade. When I put a new blank card in with the upgrade files and plugged in the power… THERE WAS ZERO FEEDBACK! NO DISPLAY! For all I know it was doing it’s thing and after a few seconds of being impatient I unplugged it, so maybe I caused the problem but that’s only because it looked dead from the outset. Literally no feedback after power up… I waited 5+ seconds and then pulled power.
Verified it appeared dead even going back to my original card. That’s when I opened it and saw the green light and found this thread.
Thinking the 8GB card I tried was the problem I dug out another 4GB card to use for this recovery procedure and it worked. Came to life, said it upgraded (but I admittedly forgot confirm via the menu.) Of course I had no songs on this card, it was empty to start with.
Here’s where my questions start. I assumed that if I then put my original songs card back it with the old 3.8.0 firmware the darn thing might downgrade. Would it? Decided I didn’t want to chance that so, assuming it upgraded successfully once, I threw caution to the wind and replaced the files on my original card. Put it in and powered up hoping to see nothing happen but have my songs back.
The darn thing upgraded AGAIN! Is that expected? The presence of the new files wasn’t enough so the upgrade must mark the card in some way to show it’s been done?
Anyway, I’m happy it’s back. Thought I’d throw my experience out there in case it’s useful knowledge. Thanks for the continued great support of this awesome product.
Rob
Usually if all 5 of the firmware files are present on the card, it will probably apply the firmware (either an upgrade or a downgrade).
If your card had all 5 of the firmware files, it will most likely upgrade, even if it’s the same firmware version. I think the pedal knows an upgrade has taken place when only the files mlo and app remain on the card. In other words, if the 3 files with the .bin extension are gone, the upgrade is assumed to have taken place.
Not knowing the exact details of what you might have done, the above two answers are merely my opinion FWIW. 
Glad you got it working, though!
I purchased a used beat buddy from a reputable guitar shop in my area, it worked in the store, sounded great, no issues. Having read in many places that updating the firmware on the pedal ensures getting the most out of it, I checked the unit when I got home and it was running v3 firmware. Following the instructions on Singular Sound’s website, I drug the new firmware onto the SD card (4gb that came with the pedal from Singular), no prompts came up asking if I wanted to replace existing files, which I thought was weird, I put the SD card back in the pedal, powered it on, the screen flashed white and the unit went dead. would not power up.
contacted Singular customer service, got the instructions for Mac, followed the instructions involving BalenaEtcher, but the service department directed me to a .RAR file, not the .zip mentioned in the Mac instructions here, which remained grayed out and unelectable with balenaEtcher. I eventually found a 3rd party app to unpack the file, but it remained grayed out when I tried to navigate balenaEtcher to it. if I drug the file onto the bE window, it worked. I selected the sd card as the destination, wrote the new files to it, inserted it in my pedal, the software updated (confirmable in menu), but the pedal now reads “no song,” and singular sound service on being apprised of this says the unit is a complete loss and needs to be replaced.
how is that possible? literally the only thing that’s been done to it in 48 hours is following singular sound’s exact instructions to the letter.
has anyone else had this issue?
I just tested the process on my Mac and the instructions in the top post above still work. Since Balena Etcher has gone through several updates from when I first posted the instructions, the verbiage in BE may appear slightly differently however, they still work.
The “No Song” issue doesn’t mean your BeatBuddy (BB) needs to be replaced. If the pedal powers up and you can use the settings to check the firmware version, the pedal is working. It sounds like you might have missed the last part of my instructions.
If you have not installed the BeatBuddy Manager (BBM) yet, please download and install it BeatBuddy Manager Software 1.64 (Win/Mac)
Download the Backup SD card, unzip https://mybeatbuddy.s3.amazonaws.com/BeatBuddy_Default_Content+2.1-Project-SD_Card_Backup.zip and copy the contents (not the enclosing folder) to your bbworkspace folder
Use the BBM File - Export - Project to SD card
Eject the card and with the power off on your pedal, insert the card and then power up.
If this doesn’t work, please DM me and we’ll go from there.
issue resolved, huge thanks!
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That’s good news and glad it’s sorted out!
Power was interrupted while trying to update and now no power. I guess I’m doing something wrong. I can’t seem to figure it out and thought I was following what you said to do. I wrote to singular sound support and hopefully they will be able to help.
This can likely be fixed by flashing the BeatBuddy, Support will guide you through this process to hopefully get you back on track asap
Thank you for your reply. I heard from support this morning and they gave me instructions on what to do or the option to send me a sd card if I have a Mac which I do so I’m going with the option.
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How to restore to the original 4GB SD card？
- Download and unzip this file SD Card Full Backup
- Insert SD card in computer and copy the contents of unzipped folder to your SD card; accept the prompt to overwrite existing contents of card.
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Sorry, I mean how to restore the SD card that restored pedal power to the original 4GB. Because my original SD card was 4GB, now it only has 2GB. Thank you!
UPDATED
If you have a complete and current project in your computer’s bbworkspace folder, you’re off to a good start. To restore your factory or other SD card to it’s full storage size, follow these instructions.
For macOS:
For Windows:
My SD card has been successfully restored to 4GB, thank you!
Hi - I have a bricked BB pedal because of a power failure during firmware update. I’ve gone through the process several times with no success - I’m reformatting the SD before flashing but should I be selecting MS-DOS and Master Boot Record in Apple Disk Utility?
Sorry you’re having issues. If your Mac has a built-in SD card slot, you should be using it and not connecting your pedal via USB cable.
You should not have to reformat your SD card; use CMD-I to verify that it is MS-DOS (FAT32)
This is what my SD card displays in Ventura’s Disk Utility
However, you can reformat your card to MS-DOS(FAT32) and go thru the recovery process again. Once it’s completed, disconnect the power to your pedal, and after 30 seconds, reconnect the power to the pedal.
If it still doesn’t work, contact Support, support@singularsound.com for help. You probably won’t hear back from them until sometime after July 4.
Let us know how you get it working again.
Hi - thanks for the support. Still having no success - I followed this process: 1) reformatted the original 4GB SD card in exFAT (what Mac calls FAT32) selecting GUID partition map 2) downloaded the BeatBuddy Default Content 2.1 - Project folder and copied this to the SD card (I have a backup of all my custom stuff which I can go back to if it ever works again!) 3) followed the process for flashing EMPTY_PRODUCTION_SD.iso onto the SD card 4) inserted the card into BB with power off 5) powered up. But no success 
Just one thought - does it matter what name I give to the SD card when I reformat it?