alansrobotlab

I feel dirty for solving it this way but I don't understand enough about the system to fix it properly.
 
There's something goofy with the bluetooth controller in these chips and radxa works around it by resetting the UART connection with a service file that calls rsetup.
 
You can manually fix/repair/start bluetooth with the following command but you need to run it once every time you reboot:
https://forum.radxa.com/t/bluetooth-not-working-zero-3w-official-os/24072/5
hciattach -s 1500000 /dev/ttyS1 any 1500000 flow nosleep  
radxa has a service file that resets the bluetooth UART1 /dev/ttyS1 on boot.  To get it installed you need to install librdui, rsetup, and rsetup-config-aic8800-ttys1 from the radxa githubs
https://github.com/radxa-pkg/rsetup/releases/tag/latest
https://github.com/radxa-pkg/librtui/releases/latest
 
So the most current file links as of today are:
https://github.com/radxa-pkg/librtui/releases/download/0.1.6/librtui_0.1.6_all.deb
https://github.com/radxa-pkg/rsetup/releases/download/0.4.12/rsetup_0.4.12_all.deb
https://github.com/radxa-pkg/rsetup/releases/download/0.4.12/rsetup-config-aic8800-ttys1_0.4.12_all.deb
 
Then cd to wherever you download them to and run:
sudo apt install ./librtui_0.1.6_all.deb sudo app install ./rsetup_0.4.12_all.deb sudo apt install ./rsetup-config-aic8800-ttys1_0.4.12_all.deb  
and reboot.
 
then confirm with your tool of choice, or bluetoothctl:
spot@radxa-zero3:~$ bluetoothctl hci0 new_settings: powered bondable ssp br/edr le secure-conn cis-central cis-peripheral Agent registered [CHG] Controller 98:03:CF:D2:2C:55 Pairable: yes [bluetooth]# exit spot@radxa-zero3:~$  
Enjoy!