I just received my DGX Spark and I’m unable to complete the initial setup. I’ve tried every approach I could think of and I’m running out of ideas before opening a support ticket for a potential hardware fault. Here’s a detailed breakdown of what I’ve tried:
Setup Environment
Connecting laptop directly to the DGX Spark for the initial setup wizard
Connecting the DGX Spark directly to a monitor with keyboard and mouse (same behavior observed)
Issue 1 – WiFi Setup (infinite loop)
During the initial setup, I reach the WiFi network selection screen, select my network, enter the password, and the wizard starts the network configuration process. After waiting for the full process to complete, it returns silently to the network selection screen with no error message or feedback — creating an infinite loop. I’ve tried this with:
My home router
My phone’s mobile hotspot
Same result in both cases.
Issue 2 – LAN connection not recognized
I then tried connecting the DGX Spark via Ethernet (LAN). I waited about 10 minutes before powering it on, connected my laptop, and went through the setup wizard again. The wizard still shows the WiFi network selection screen as if it’s ignoring the LAN cable entirely. This time, after selecting a WiFi network and going through the configuration process, I get an error saying it was unable to connect to that network. Tried with both home router and mobile hotspot — same error.
Issue 3 – Recovery procedure
I followed the recovery procedure step by step as described in the official User Guide. After completing it, I repeated all the steps above and the behavior is identical — nothing changed.I also searched through this forum beforehand and found several similar reports — most of them were resolved by performing the recovery procedure. In my case, however, even after a successful recovery the issue persists unchanged, which makes me suspect this could be a hardware-level fault.
Summary of symptoms
WiFi setup loops back to network selection with no error
LAN cable is completely ignored by the setup wizard
After recovery, all issues persist
No successful network configuration in any scenario
At this point I’m wondering: is there anything else I can try before contacting support for a possible hardware failure? Has anyone experienced something similar?
I’m experiencing the same problem.
I’m in the reinstallation process, but WiFi to LAN cable connection, current time setting, phone tethering, WPA2 all won’t proceed.
I have experienced the same problems with a new Spark: no setup method works, they all fail on connectivity test stage, Ethernet’s not recognized, using an open wifi SSID didn’t help, resetting the OS with dgx-spark-recovery-image-1.120.38.tar.gz didn’t help either.
I can supply diagnostics and logs if instructed how to collect them.
[Social media disclaimer: For the purpose of this troubleshooting thread, I am here in my capacity as a private individual; my opinions are my own, and and do not represent my employer, NVIDIA Corporation.]
Seeing the exact same issue on a new unit. Ethernet isn’t detected, WiFi fails on many different SSIDs. Flashed the latest recovery iso, made zero difference.
Posted a patch for anyone else that might want to get past this issue:
I tried rebooting 3 times, but when I press Ctrl+Alt+F2, it goes to the process of shutting down the PC from WiFi, and after a few minutes there… After forcing a shutdown by pressing the power switch once, it can go directly to the GX10 main screen without that part.
There were no problems with wired + wireless connections on the main screen.
Thanks @aniculescu, that was indeed the issue! I just tried again and everything works perfectly now. The setup completed without any problems. Really appreciate you looking into it and sharing the root cause!