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DS3231 Initialization

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Gayan Soyza

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Guys I have a problem with DS3231 chip. Made a clock with a cheap Ebay module & it worked fine.

After 1 month of continuous run the time halted. After searching the internet found that the crude charging circuit & the battery gives lots of problems & need to remove the crude Li cells charging circuit on these modules. I modified the circuit & placed a new CR2032 battery.

The problem is in a good A/C condition (cool) the time works fine. At home (Hot) the time holds & not counting. The time increments sometimes very slowly.

I just guess does the Aging Register have some garbage values after my battery issue? Do you guys set this register when power up the chip?
 

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hi Gayan,
I have used a number of these modules for many, many months, all OK.
The only problem was that the initial CR2032 cell that was supplied with the modules failed after after about a month, I guess it is the same as many manufacturers, they use cheap batteries in order to keep the costs down.

I have had no problems with the charging circuits, so far.

I suspect your problem is the inbuilt crystal oscillator, which is failing when the DS3231 gets 'hot'.

The ageing register programming just adds/subtracts very low value capacitors connected in parallel with main cap, which I understand is about 6pF.
The ageing register is normally trimmed/set by the manufacturer, you can add/subtract oscillator capacitance to adjust for a 'fast/slow' clock.
I do not set the ageing reg at power up.

Eric
Attached a copy of the DS3231 PDF.
A001.gif
 

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Hi Eric thanks for the details.

I suspect your problem is the inbuilt crystal oscillator, which is failing when the DS3231 gets 'hot'.

That's a very sad story.I ordered 20 modules of these & I have those modules at the moment.In my clock I just use this module as a plug in type.With this type of errors I cannot use this module :(

I still use the DS1307 code.Not even touching the CONTROL registers in DS3231 because the Oscillator Enable is active when first powered up.

I still wondering the factory value of the Aging register or may be its coming with a value of "0" :(
 
hi,
You could test read register 10h, in order to check the age reg value.
Note it will change with temperature.

I assume that you have pull up resistors on the SCL and SDA line.??

E
 

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I have some too, and they were supplied with non rechargeable batteries.
I never messed with the xtal age register, as far as I know it auto updates.
If you just have the one faulty, bin it and try again, might just be a one off.
 
I also monitored the Aging register values of my other modules using a serial monitor.It shows value of "0".Even though if I remove the battery & check the aging value is still 0.Will se how it goes :) Still wondering how this chip got this problem..!!
 

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Are you sure the age register is actually readable.
 
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