r/adafruit

Components:
• Adafruit HUZZAH32 – ESP32 Feather Board (Product 3591, pre-soldered headers)
• Adafruit eInk Feather Friend with 32KB SRAM (Product 4446) — headers soldered by me
• Adafruit 2.13” 250x122 Monochrome eInk Bare Display, SSD1680Z chip (Product 6383)
• Connected via the display’s own built-in FPC cable, direct to the Feather Friend’s connector (not using an extension cable)

What I’ve done:
• Soldered female headers onto the Feather Friend myself (first time soldering).
• Followed Adafruit’s official guide/example code exactly for this display: \[learn.adafruit.com/bare-e-ink-displays-crash-course/2-13-250x122-monochrome-or-gray-eink-ssd1680z\]
• Confirmed via Serial Monitor that the code uploads and runs — it correctly prints “Adafruit EPD full update test in mono” and “2.13 Monochrome EPD with SSD1680Z chipset,” so the code and chip ID are right.

What’s not working:
• The display shows absolutely nothing — no image, and critically, no flash/flicker at all during the update sequence (I understand e-ink normally flashes black/white during any refresh, even a failed one).
• Tried: reseating the FPC cable at both ends multiple times, checking cable orientation, pressing the physical RST button after upload, and a full reflow of every joint on the header. No change in any case — still zero flash, every time.

What I’m trying to figure out:
Since I get zero flash under any condition, does that point more toward (a) a specific bad solder joint on the header (likely one of the display-control pins — CS/DC/RST/BUSY — rather than power), (b) the FPC cable itself being faulty/backwards, or (c) something else I haven’t considered?

Thank you so much for your help!!!

It won’t detect the 280…. I know I soldered the wrong way is that the issue ?? The wiring is definitely correct according to the attached chart. Did I place it wrong ?? Claude is helping me to no avail.