Brunswick Sync - TROUBLESHOOTING STEPS; Step 1: Identify the Specific Symptoms; Step 2: Make a List of Potential Causes of the Symptom; Step 3: Prioritize Your List

Troubleshooting 5
TROUBLESHOOTING STEPS
Troubleshooting is not simply nding the cause of a problem and xing it. Troubleshooting is more
properly dened as identifying the specic symptoms, listing the potential causes of the symptoms,
and then eliminating these potential causes one by one. In other words troubleshooting is a process of
elimination.
Step 1: Identify the Specic Symptoms:
Identifying the specic symptom can be the most difcult part of troubleshooting. Many times you
need to rely on second hand information or, at the very least, information that come from an uniformed
source. Many times the person providing the information will have a different perspective of the
equipment than that of a mechanic or may use different terms to describe the situation. Because of this
always verify and clarify what you are told. If you don’t, you might be troubleshooting problems that
don’t exist.
Step 2: Make a List of Potential Causes of the Symptom.
Once you have identied the symptom(s), use your manual, experience, and any other source of
information to make a list of things that may have anything, whatsoever, to do with the symptom. Put it
on your list even if it may not be a likely culprit.
Step 3: Prioritize Your List
Reorder the list. Put items that are most likely causes at the top and work your way down to the least
likely. During this step you should ask questions such as “Has anything changed recently”, “Has
someone worked on the system”, “Has software been updated or re-congured”, “Is this and easy or
hard thing to check”. The answers to these types of questions can inuence the position of the items on
the list.
Step 4: Eliminate Potential Causes
Try to eliminate the rst item on your list. Depending on the item, this can be done by swapping
components or cables connections, altering congurations, taking voltage measurement, or by simply
observation. Whatever you can safely do eliminate the item as a cause is acceptable. Be as creative
as necessary but remember that you don’t want to do anything that might damage the system or that
you can’t undo. IF YOU ARE UNSURE ABOUT SOMETHING: DON’T DO IT. Also remember to
properly congure any component that you swap or replace (if required). If the prior steps were done
properly, you will eventually get to an item that cannot be eliminated as the cause. Finally, “think big”.
During the elimination process more you can sometimes eliminate more than one item on your list by
troubleshooting complete components or boxes rather than individual components.
Step 5: What to Do if Steps 1-4 Didn’t Solve Your Problem
If after following steps 1 -4 you still have not solved your problem, you need to start again. Verify each
step to ensure that good decisions have been made. Talk to others that are knowledgeable about your
system. Many times just talking with someone will give you a fresh perspective on things and may give
you ideas that weren’t considered the rst time around.
Additional Tips
Cycling power (powering the unit off, then on) or re-seating a connector or circuit board corrects most
problems.
Always verify that a replacement component is actually defective by installing it in another unit.
The simplest solution is normally the correct one and the one most often overlooked.