I'll perform an autopsy on the dead one I have to hopefully be able to help identify the reason for this current problem.
FIXED!!
I completely stripped my 0806 and found a dodgy solder joint on a transistor on the CPU/NAND/sensor/lens PCB.
When I had tried to power it on, while apart, only the green LED lit up very dimly and the CPU heatsink would get very warm.
The dimly lit green LED could not be seen when the 0806 was together.
Luckily there is SMD rework equipment where I work, so I was able to fix this and a few other minor problems very easily.
With a lot of care, a fine tipped soldering iron, magnifier, flux and fine desolder braid can possibly be used.
In the 1st instance, it would be much better to return under warranty before pulling a 0806 apart.
When the 0806 was back together, nothing worked when attempting to power up.
It would only be detected as an unknown USB device on a Windows PC. The drivers for DirectUSB didn't work.
Holding down both the "Up" and "Down" buttons, pressing and holding the power button and connecting to USB lit up the Red LED and allowed the 0806 to be correctly detected in Windows. "Init dram OK" came up once connected in DirectUSB.
I downloaded the elf file to the 0806 (instead of "upload" as in the un-brick guide). It successfully completed (green bar at 100% and leaving for several minutes)
I disconnected and restarted the 0806 with a microSD with the latest firmware.
The firmware loaded correctly........and I once again had a fully functional 0806.
From my experience, I believe the "Recover Bricked Mini 0806 Camera" guide is incorrect in parts and misleading. "Upload" would only always result in errors for me.
I don't know if it is correct for an earlier iteration of the 0806, but do know it isn't for my 2nd batch 0806.
For other people having major problems (a dead 0806), it might be worth trying the button sequence as per above with DirectUSB.
For those that can at least get a Red LED, hold down the "Up" button and connect the USB cable when using DirectUSB.
Thanks to everyone who responded to my earlier problem with GPS metadata overlay/subtitle, you are all correct.
I didn't have the same playback problem with Windows media players and was able to get it sorted on my Linux machines.
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