Author Topic: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10  (Read 27394 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline MrAl

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1395
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #25 on: April 06, 2018, 02:21:25 am »
Hi,

I would think that a cable that works with PicKit anything would NOT be just a power-only cable because it has to allow communication with the host computer.  Of course this doesnt mean that there could be isnt anything bad about the cable.  The obvious thing to do is get another cable.  It's good to have a spare anyway because they do go south after plugging and unplugging many many times.

I've had no problem with the 340 chip under Win 7 so maybe you could try a compatibility setting.

I have had another problem though with the Leonardo, in that it wont work in a USB 3.0 slot, only USB 2.0, under Win 7 with a ASUS mo bo.  I have read this is a mo bo issue with the driver they use.  Works great in the USB 2.0 slot though.
 

Online Ian.M

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 12806
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #26 on: April 06, 2018, 08:01:34 am »
@Vegeta:  Please give a time reference for the section of your video that's relevant.  Few of us will wade through 40 minutes of video to find the interesting bits.   If you give a brief summary of the rest of it with times, you may even pick up a few viewers.

A power only 'USB' cable gives no indication on the PC when its connected - no sounds, no tray icons and nothing in Device Manager.
 It cant be the cable if its still working reliably with a PICkit 3 for programming, debugging and powering the target board.
   
As to your CH340G problems, do a loopback test.   Ground the Arduino's reset pin, and jumper its RX to TX (Digital pin #0 to digital pin #1) to take the ATmega328P out of the loop and open the COM port with a terminal program (with hardware handshaking and local echo disabled).  The one in the Arduino IDE will do if you don't have anything better - it doesn't have hardware handshaking or local echo so no configuration will be needed.   If it fails at opening the port, either the drivers or CH340G chip are bad, (or the terminal program's totally borked - if you've got one, try a different serial port to eliminate that.  If its a 'real' PC serial port with a DE-9 connector, jumper pins 2 to 3 for loopback).   If it opens, every character you send should be echoed, and you can see the signal pulse on the jumper between RX and TX if you use a scope or logic probe.  Double check by disconnecting the RX-TX jumper.  The characters should no longer be echoed.    If you get a double echo that drops to a single one when you disconnect the RX-TX jumper, that's also O.K. - it just means your terminal program has 'local echo' turned on. 

If you don't get an echo or it doesn't match what you type, its back to driver or CH340G chip problems.  Try it on a different PC, preferably NOT running Windows 10, to eliminate the driver.

Finally, crank up the baud rate in the terminal to 115200, reconnect the RX-TX jumper and confirm it still passes the loopback test as AVRDUDE typically uses that speed when uploading a sketch.

Once you've confirmed that it passes a loopback test, the only remaining problems are around the ATmega328P chip.   As you've been flashing it via the AVR ISP connector, odds are you don't have a valid Arduino bootloader in it.   Sometimes cheap Arduino clones come without a bootloader when the ghost shift that made them skipped testing and progamming them.   Its an easy fix - hook up an ISP programmer, make sure the right board and ISP programmer are selected in the IDE and click 'Burn Bootloader' at the bottom of the Tools menu.

Remove the reset grounding and RX-TX jumpers, go into the IDE's preferences and enable (tick) 'Show verbose output during: upload'  and try uploading a sketch.  All should be good.

If it fails with
Code: [Select]
avrdude: stk500_getsync() attempt 1 of 10: not in sync: resp=0x30 then either there is a problem with the CH340G pulsing the Reset pin (check it with a scope or logic probe) or the ATmega's  TXD or RXD pins are damaged or its oscillator isn't working.  (If  the Reset pin was damaged, ISP programming would have failed.)
« Last Edit: April 07, 2018, 09:48:55 am by Ian.M »
 

Offline VEGETATopic starter

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1916
  • Country: jo
  • I am the cult of personality
    • Thundertronics
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #27 on: April 06, 2018, 02:06:36 pm »
I took your advise and put timeframe links within video description:

Now you can see all the items and jump to them in video as well as get their link.

I will be using USBtinyISP for now with CH340 Arduinos... I still didn't test it yet.

Offline VEGETATopic starter

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1916
  • Country: jo
  • I am the cult of personality
    • Thundertronics
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #28 on: April 06, 2018, 02:33:06 pm »
Speaking of views, My channel is about 3400 hours in last 12 months and thus I need another 600 hours or so to get monetization back. People here do some watch farms where they put their browsers on "watch all" to get some views but I don't know if this is efficient or not.

Offline sairfan1

  • Frequent Contributor
  • **
  • Posts: 348
  • Country: ca
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #29 on: April 06, 2018, 02:56:26 pm »
Just want to share my experience, this is right that windows 10 is making issue with drivers, that is because of clone devices, i have an other laptop with windows 7 installed (one i was using in the past) i have been disabled its updates, i often solve such problems by installing such devices on windows 7
 

Offline westfw

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 4196
  • Country: us
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #30 on: April 07, 2018, 09:32:42 am »
Quote
I have the drivers and my windows recognizes CH340 when I plug my Arduino Nano v3 but Arduino IDE says unknown board.
That SHOULD be OK.  Of course the board is "unknown" if it's some sort of generic USB/Serial chip instead of the arduino-specific VID/PID that identifies it exactly.   But that shouldn't interfere with the Arduino IDE uploading to it.

(not counting the "Old Bootloader" fiasco that someone has already mentioned.  Or boards that have an "unexpected" bootloader.)
 

Offline Rick Law

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 3423
  • Country: us
Re: Problem with CH340 cheap Arduinos in Windows 10
« Reply #31 on: April 08, 2018, 10:21:27 pm »
Quote
I have the drivers and my windows recognizes CH340 when I plug my Arduino Nano v3 but Arduino IDE says unknown board.
...
(not counting the "Old Bootloader" fiasco that someone has already mentioned.  Or boards that have an "unexpected" bootloader.)
...

Given the NANO's are so cheap...  Once you get one working as ISP flash burner, it is a good idea to reserve it as a dedicated ISP flasher - and make sure you have it with the Arduino ISP bootloader hex file(s) frozen and working locally.

With that, you have the confident that come what may, you can always blast a new chip/board with the proper bootloader.
 


Share me

Digg  Facebook  SlashDot  Delicious  Technorati  Twitter  Google  Yahoo
Smf