[SOLVED] Can't update firmware on UM2 - I think I've checked all the obvious stuff!

[purps 9]

Guys thank you so much for your inputs.

Reflashing through the ICSP header and/or via avrdude sounds quite drastic. Of course I will give it a go if necessary. Is the ICSP essentially a serial connection? How does it differ from USB?

I'll check for /dev/ttyACM0 later when I get home. So do my code dumps confirm that usbcore is not registering the device?

Thanks for the video. Can I safely do this on an UM2?

I found this thread where @gr5 gives his usual helpful advice (Posted Apr 10, 2014 - 8:48 PM), so I shall give that a go on the Windows machine.

https://ultimaker.com/en/community/6100-how-to-update-um2-firmware

Other things I will mention, just in case.....

One of the LEDs has broken (or gone to very high resistance...), causing the other 5 in the segment to go dim. Surely that wouldn't be causing this problem? I realise I am scraping the barrel here.

Thank you both again for your support. I hope we can get to the bottom of this!

[amedee 349]

Reflashing through the ICSP header and/or via avrdude sounds quite drastic. Of course I will give it a go if necessary.

 

ICSP is indeed a bit drastic, but avrdude is not -- it is what I always do, and I do it quite often as I maintain an alternative firmware for the UMO.

 

Is the ICSP essentially a serial connection? How does it differ from USB?

 

It is a serial protocol, but it requires a special adapter (Or an Arduino).

 

I'll check for /dev/ttyACM0 later when I get home. So do my code dumps confirm that usbcore is not registering the device?

 

Difficult to be formal on that, but I have a couple of lines more than you have when I connect my printer...

 

Thanks for the video. Can I safely do this on an UM2?

 

Absolutely, it is the same board (you just need to select the right firmware )

 

I found this thread where @gr5 gives his usual helpful advice (Posted Apr 10, 2014 - 8:48 PM), so I shall give that a go on the Windows machine.

 

I can't help you with that side of the Force

[SyntaxTerror 344]

Reflashing through the ICSP header and/or via avrdude sounds quite drastic. Of course I will give it a go if necessary. Is the ICSP essentially a serial connection? How does it differ from USB?

 

Do you know Arduinos? Basically they're microcontroller breakout boards where someone was brilliant enough to take away the hassle of dealing with a dedicated programmer. They did so by giving the microcontroller a bootloader that allows the user to reprogram it via the serial port (which is not normal behaviour). So basically there's a USB->TTL serial converter that lets your PC interface with the microcontroller and upload new code. That's exactly what Cura wants to do with the board. If the bootloader is borked, then we won't be able to ever do this. That's where the ICSP port comes in. That'd be the normal way to program the microcontroller if it didn't have a bootloader. I don't think it's drastic, only inconvenient. Hell, that's how things are programmed under normal circumstances. It just requires you to have a programmer of some sort.

 

I'll check for /dev/ttyACM0 later when I get home. So do my code dumps confirm that usbcore is not registering the device?

 

I must admit I'm simply not certain at this point. Just.. too damn rusty with drivers. More thinking required on my part

 

One of the LEDs has broken (or gone to very high resistance...), causing the other 5 in the segment to go dim. Surely that wouldn't be causing this problem? I realise I am scraping the barrel here.

 

Nah, don't worry about that.

[purps 9]

It's sorted. Phew.

Although the firmware is only 2.4, not 2.5 - is there no new firmware with 2.5?

The problem was drivers... on both the Windows machine and the Linux machine. Two independent problems that gave the same symptoms. So I started with the Windows machine, reinstalled the Arduino driver (by installing Cura 2.5), and it worked straight away. I don't know what was wrong with the Arduino driver before.

I'll have a look at the Linux machine in slower time, but at least I know what the problem was.

Can I just say a massive thank you to @SyntaxTerror and @amedee for looking into this with me - it felt a lot less daunting knowing there are people willing to help me out!

And sorry to @spiracy for implying you had conned me haha, but what do you expect, I find threads listing all these problems you've had and your eBay account disappeared haha.

Cheers,

Matt.

[SyntaxTerror 344]

Ahh excellent! Happy to hear everything worked out in the end. It is a terribly odd coincidence that it didn't work to begin with on two separate systems. Linux in particular usually does not suffer from driver issues like this. But hey, who cares. The firmware's in now

[amedee 349]

Good news, enjoy your new firmware (and the upgrade )