Manage an Edge machine

Manage paired Edge machines under Settings → Edge Devices. Expand a machine to see its network, peripherals, displays, and update status.

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Understand machine status

Also check Last seen. It tells you whether an offline event is recent or whether the machine has been unreachable for a longer period.

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Read the status LEDs

A red LED starts after repeated failed check-ins, not after a single dropped request.

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Change Wi-Fi

When the machine is still online: If a paired machine starts with no usable network—for example, after its Wi-Fi password changes—it waits about two minutes and then opens Stardeck-Setup-XXXX automatically. Reconnect it using the same Wi-Fi-only flow.

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Automatic updates

Edge software updates are automatic. The machine periodically checks for a signed release, downloads it, applies it, and confirms that it can start and reach Stardeck. If the new version fails its health check, the machine automatically returns to the previous working version. A power interruption during an update is also recovered after the next boot. Do not unplug the machine while it shows Applying unless there is a physical safety issue.

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Move, replace, or remove a machine

• Moving it to a new network: use Forget & show hotspot before unplugging it when possible.
• Replacing a printer: configure the replacement, then re-point the app’s existing alias.
• Replacing the Edge machine: pair the new machine, grant it to the same apps, and re-create or repair the affected aliases.
• Retiring or transferring it: remove its app grants, clear any displays, then remove the machine from Edge Devices.

Remove device marks the machine Decommissioned and tells it to wipe its pairing. A machine that is powered on and online does this within about a minute, then comes back on its own Stardeck-Setup-XXXX network, ready to pair again. It keeps its saved Wi-Fi and its installed software version. A machine that is switched off or offline is told the next time it checks in. Decommissioned machines stay listed, folded away at the bottom of Edge Devices. Deleting the record is a separate, deliberate second step.

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Give the hardware to another organization

A machine’s serial number can only be registered by one organization at a time, so a transfer needs the record gone, not just decommissioned:

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Fix a machine by hand

When you can reach the hardware but not the dashboard — no network, no laptop, a machine someone else removed — two gestures at the machine itself cover it. Both are spelled the same way, on either:

• the power button, or
• Backspace on any USB keyboard. Plug one in at any time; the machine notices within a few seconds. This is the only method on machines without a power button.

Reach for five when only the network is wrong: the machine moved rooms, or the Wi-Fi password changed. It is the smaller of the two on purpose — a factory reset would mean re-pairing from your dashboard to fix something that was never broken.

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Change the Wi-Fi

Tap five times within five seconds. The red LED flutters rapidly for about a second, then the machine restarts and raises Stardeck-Setup-XXXX so you can give it the new network. Give it about two minutes to appear — the machine waits to be sure the network is really gone, then looks twice for the networks nearby so the list it shows you is complete, before raising its own. Nothing happens the instant you stop tapping: the machine waits out the full five seconds first, in case you are still going and meant eight. Six or seven taps do the same thing as five — only the eighth changes the outcome.

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Factory reset

Tap eight times within five seconds. Taps have to be taps — a press held for more than a second is not one, and holding the power button is a hardware power-off the software never sees. Any other key cancels it, so the eight Backspaces have to stand alone — ordinary typing at an attached keyboard, like deleting a mistyped line, can never reset a machine by accident. After the eighth tap the green LED strobes for about two seconds, then the machine restarts onto Stardeck-Setup-XXXX. Taps also blink the green LED as you go, though at the speed the gesture needs you should not expect one blink per tap — the strobe at the end is the signal that counts. The lights are how you tell the two gestures apart without counting: a steady green strobe means the machine was reset, a rapid red flutter means only the Wi-Fi was forgotten. The flutter is deliberately unlike the slow red blink of a machine that is merely offline. If you were going for eight and saw red, you stopped short — the machine is still paired, and you can give it its network back or try the eight again. If the machine is on a network you can reach but is physically awkward to get to, its setup page offers the same Factory reset under Diagnostics, confirmed with the machine’s serial number. Ten wrong serials pause that for a minute, then it accepts attempts again.