Author Topic: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review  (Read 1441732 times)

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Offline TheBay

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1375 on: October 21, 2018, 11:03:36 am »
I see V6.85 of the software has been released.

Anyone tried it?

Just installed it, still getting the warning message "This is a changed programmer from the TL866CS!!"
When mine isn't! it still shows as a TL866A though in the programme, unsure yet if anything has been gimped.
 

Offline FrankBuss

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1376 on: October 21, 2018, 11:17:00 am »
Just installed it, still getting the warning message "This is a changed programmer from the TL866CS!!"
When mine isn't! it still shows as a TL866A though in the programme, unsure yet if anything has been gimped.

This doesn't sound good. Does it still work? I have v6.60, works fine for me, without warnings.

For tools, IDEs etc., usually I follow the principle "if it ain't broke don't fix it", meaning if I don't need a new feature, I don't update (if the program is not security related, like the operating system, which of course needs to be updated all the time, or other internet connected programs). Just yesterday I used the programmer for an ATTiny25 and it supports the parallel programming mode, and all fuse settings in the "Config" tab, without problems, so I can set the fuse for the reset pin etc. and don't brick it. Doesn't matter much for a price of 0.70 cents per IC, but easier to develop if you can do lots of iterations and tests without fearing to pay like one postage stamp per test :)
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Offline TheBay

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1377 on: October 21, 2018, 11:24:33 am »
Just installed it, still getting the warning message "This is a changed programmer from the TL866CS!!"
When mine isn't! it still shows as a TL866A though in the programme, unsure yet if anything has been gimped.

This doesn't sound good. Does it still work? I have v6.60, works fine for me, without warnings.

For tools, IDEs etc., usually I follow the principle "if it ain't broke don't fix it", meaning if I don't need a new feature, I don't update (if the program is not security related, like the operating system, which of course needs to be updated all the time, or other internet connected programs). Just yesterday I used the programmer for an ATTiny25 and it supports the parallel programming mode, and all fuse settings in the "Config" tab, without problems, so I can set the fuse for the reset pin etc. and don't brick it. Doesn't matter much for a price of 0.70 cents per IC, but easier to develop if you can do lots of iterations and tests without fearing to pay like one postage stamp per test :)

I just used Radioman's TL866 tool.
And it said I had an invalid checksum, so I followed all his instructions and flashed 6.8.2 in firmware dumper mode, let it write a new checksum then flashed 6.8.2.
Installed Minipro 6.8.5 and let it update the firmware, now the error message has gone and its still showing as a A model. (Mine was always a genuine A, not sure what went wrong with one of the minipro updates)

Thanks Radioman for all your hard work!
 

Offline tchicago

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1378 on: October 22, 2018, 11:26:54 pm »
Just installed it, still getting the warning message "This is a changed programmer from the TL866CS!!"
When mine isn't! it still shows as a TL866A though in the programme, unsure yet if anything has been gimped.

This doesn't sound good. Does it still work? I have v6.60, works fine for me, without warnings.

It doesn't work after that error. Whenever you try to read some MCU, it will always give ID check error. And will read gibberish if you ignore error. Tried rebooting disconnecting, restarting everything. Tried to read multiple controllers (PICs and ATMEL's) - same ID check error everywhere.

I then reverted it all back to v6.71 - both PC software and firmware, keeping it kept firmware at "A" version though. And it all works now, with same MCUs I tried before - they now ID'd and read just fine.
 

Offline FrankBuss

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1379 on: October 22, 2018, 11:39:24 pm »
It doesn't work after that error. Whenever you try to read some MCU, it will always give ID check error. And will read gibberish if you ignore error. Tried rebooting disconnecting, restarting everything. Tried to read multiple controllers (PICs and ATMEL's) - same ID check error everywhere.

I then reverted it all back to v6.71 - both PC software and firmware, keeping it kept firmware at "A" version though. And it all works now, with same MCUs I tried before - they now ID'd and read just fine.

There is even a V8.05 version out now:

http://www.autoelectric.cn/en/tl866_main.html

But it lists the changelog as well and I don't need it at the moment, just a few PICs that were added could be interesting someday, but I have a PICkit3 for this.

And the webpage says "TL866CS/A programmer has ceased production.". Maybe this is the reason that it is not compatible anymore? Or is it the fight with Radioman and then inadvertently introducing bugs? This would be bad.
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Offline tchicago

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1380 on: October 23, 2018, 01:22:04 am »
It doesn't work after that error. Whenever you try to read some MCU, it will always give ID check error. And will read gibberish if you ignore error. Tried rebooting disconnecting, restarting everything. Tried to read multiple controllers (PICs and ATMEL's) - same ID check error everywhere.

I then reverted it all back to v6.71 - both PC software and firmware, keeping it kept firmware at "A" version though. And it all works now, with same MCUs I tried before - they now ID'd and read just fine.

There is even a V8.05 version out now:

http://www.autoelectric.cn/en/tl866_main.html

But it lists the changelog as well and I don't need it at the moment, just a few PICs that were added could be interesting someday, but I have a PICkit3 for this.

And the webpage says "TL866CS/A programmer has ceased production.". Maybe this is the reason that it is not compatible anymore? Or is it the fight with Radioman and then inadvertently introducing bugs? This would be bad.

Those 8.x versions are for TL866-II hardware. The latest version for TL866CS/A is 6.8.5. It is a bit lower on that page, there is a separate section with the software for the non-II versions of the programmer.
 

Offline TheBay

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1381 on: October 23, 2018, 03:24:50 am »
Just installed it, still getting the warning message "This is a changed programmer from the TL866CS!!"
When mine isn't! it still shows as a TL866A though in the programme, unsure yet if anything has been gimped.

This doesn't sound good. Does it still work? I have v6.60, works fine for me, without warnings.

It doesn't work after that error. Whenever you try to read some MCU, it will always give ID check error. And will read gibberish if you ignore error. Tried rebooting disconnecting, restarting everything. Tried to read multiple controllers (PICs and ATMEL's) - same ID check error everywhere.

I then reverted it all back to v6.71 - both PC software and firmware, keeping it kept firmware at "A" version though. And it all works now, with same MCUs I tried before - they now ID'd and read just fine.
What about if you correct the checksum and refresh,
Does it still have problems with certain MCU's?
Mine has always stayed an A and it's actually a genuine A model and annoying got that nag screen. I contacted them and they just said to turn the message off lol.

Now I've corrected the checksum it's never thrown that nag screen up again.


 

Offline tchicago

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1382 on: October 23, 2018, 07:11:41 pm »
What about if you correct the checksum and refresh,
Does it still have problems with certain MCU's?
Mine has always stayed an A and it's actually a genuine A model and annoying got that nag screen. I contacted them and they just said to turn the message off lol.

Now I've corrected the checksum it's never thrown that nag screen up again.

It showed the nag screen only once, at the end of updating firmware via the MiniProg. After that, all status was OK upon restarts and reconnects. Yet, it was consistently failing to work properly - ID check errors and reading garbage from various MCUs. Those were mature MCUs - like ATMEGA328, ATTINY84, some not very recent PICs. Some MCUs were known blanks straight out of Digikey packaging, some with my code.

I decided not to mess up with the versions that do hardware checks anymore, and rolled back to 6.71. Everything was working properly after that.
 

Offline TheBay

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1383 on: October 23, 2018, 07:47:48 pm »
What about if you correct the checksum and refresh,
Does it still have problems with certain MCU's?
Mine has always stayed an A and it's actually a genuine A model and annoying got that nag screen. I contacted them and they just said to turn the message off lol.

Now I've corrected the checksum it's never thrown that nag screen up again.

It showed the nag screen only once, at the end of updating firmware via the MiniProg. After that, all status was OK upon restarts and reconnects. Yet, it was consistently failing to work properly - ID check errors and reading garbage from various MCUs. Those were mature MCUs - like ATMEGA328, ATTINY84, some not very recent PICs. Some MCUs were known blanks straight out of Digikey packaging, some with my code.

I decided not to mess up with the versions that do hardware checks anymore, and rolled back to 6.71. Everything was working properly after that.

Checksum is still wrong if it showed the nag screen.
Fix the checksum, remove programme and flash again.
 

Offline Southerner

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MiniPro TL866 Supported chip list
« Reply #1384 on: October 29, 2018, 04:26:36 am »
I was looking at the supported chip list for the TL866 but was surprised by the absence of the AVR chips (ATMega's).  I also thought it interesting that there were listed many logic chips like almost all of the 74HCxx and 74LSxx and 74LSxxx logic chips that are not programmable.  Why are those in the list at all?

I was hoping to use it to program some ATMega382P's but guess that won't happen.
 

Offline drussell

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Re: MiniPro TL866 Supported chip list
« Reply #1385 on: October 29, 2018, 04:33:37 am »
I also thought it interesting that there were listed many logic chips like almost all of the 74HCxx and 74LSxx and 74LSxxx logic chips that are not programmable.  Why are those in the list at all?

They are listed because those logic chips can be tested for proper operation, that all gates function correctly, etc.

As for ATMegas, under ATMEL the supported chip list includes:

Code: [Select]
ATMEGA8
ATMEGA8L                  ATMEGA8A                  ATMEGA16                 ATMEGA16L                   
ATMEGA16A                 ATMEGA32                  ATMEGA32L                ATMEGA32A                   
ATMEGA48                  ATMEGA48V                 ATMEGA48A                ATMEGA48PA                 
ATMEGA64     @TQFP64      ATMEGA64A    @TQFP64      ATMEGA64L   @TQFP64      ATMEGA88                   
ATMEGA88V                 ATMEGA88A                 ATMEGA88PA               ATMEGA128    @TQFP64       
ATMEGA128A   @TQFP64      ATMEGA128L   @TQFP64      ATMEGA162                ATMEGA162V                 
ATMEGA164A                ATMEGA164PA               ATMEGA165A  @TQFP64      ATMEGA165P   @TQFP64         
ATMEGA165PA  @TQFP64      ATMEGA165PV  @TQFP64      ATMEGA168                ATMEGA168A                 
ATMEGA168PA               ATMEGA168V                ATMEGA169A  @TQFP64      ATMEGA169P   @TQFP64       
ATMEGA169PA  @TQFP64      ATMEGA169PV  @TQFP64      ATMEGA324A               ATMEGA324PA                 
ATMEGA325A   @TQFP64      ATMEGA325PA  @TQFP64      ATMEGA328                ATMEGA328P                 
ATMEGA329A   @TQFP64      ATMEGA329PA  @TQFP64      ATMEGA644A               ATMEGA644PA                 
ATMEGA645A   @TQFP64      ATMEGA645P   @TQFP64      ATMEGA649A  @TQFP64      ATMEGA649P   @TQFP64         
ATMEGA1284                ATMEGA1284P               ATMEGA8515               ATMEGA8515L
« Last Edit: October 29, 2018, 04:55:28 am by drussell »
 

Offline Macbeth

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Re: MiniPro TL866 Supported chip list
« Reply #1386 on: October 29, 2018, 10:11:52 pm »
I was hoping to use it to program some ATMega382P's but guess that won't happen.

This is most unfortunate, those '382P's must be something special. I guess a unique part like that really can't be supported as nobody else knows what they are.

All other ATmega or ATtiny I haven't had any problem with the TL866 whatsoever. Indeed it has recovered many a young ATtiny by HV programming.
 
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Offline texaspyro

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1387 on: October 30, 2018, 12:19:18 am »
There isn't a '382P... did you mean '328P?
 

Offline drussell

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Re: MiniPro TL866 Supported chip list
« Reply #1388 on: October 30, 2018, 01:05:58 am »
I was hoping to use it to program some ATMega382P's but guess that won't happen.

This is most unfortunate, those '382P's must be something special. I guess a unique part like that really can't be supported as nobody else knows what they are.

There isn't a '382P... did you mean '328P?

I had made the assumption that it was a typo when Southerner said 382P that she actually meant 328P.

I don't think there is such a thing as a 382 but it is a common transposition.  :)
 

Offline Southerner

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Re: MiniPro TL866 Supported chip list
« Reply #1389 on: October 30, 2018, 04:35:12 am »
Quote from: drussell
I had made the assumption that it was a typo when Southerner said 382P that she actually meant 328P.
I don't think there is such a thing as a 382 but it is a common transposition.  :)
Yes,  it was a typo.  I did mean 328P but see that the link I took was to an old support list and did not include the ATMega328P but noticed that it is now included.
 

Offline Synthtech

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1390 on: October 30, 2018, 07:33:14 am »
Sorry if this has been brought up already somewhere in the last 56 pages but I just want to make sure that I am up to speed before I order: the current version of the programmer (TL866 II Plus) doesn’t support 21V programming unlike the older versions so it’s somewhat useless to me as most of the chips that I program are 21V devices. I was however thinking of getting one just to use as a tester for 4000 and 74 series IC’s, does it do a decent job of this?
 

Offline minsik

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1391 on: October 31, 2018, 12:52:39 pm »
seems like autoelectric.cn has gone awol. saves on making updates eh?
Years of working with electronics. Now its just for fun.
 

Offline drussell

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1392 on: October 31, 2018, 01:19:09 pm »
seems like autoelectric.cn has gone awol. saves on making updates eh?

Huh?  It works fine for me...

http://autoelectric.cn/EN/TL866_main.html
 

Offline pelule

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1393 on: October 31, 2018, 05:54:10 pm »
Works also fine for me...(but slow as usual)
/PeLuLe
You will learn something new every single day
 

Offline Southerner

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1394 on: October 31, 2018, 06:16:07 pm »
(but slow as usual)
/PeLuLe
Slow is putting it mildly!  It took 7 minutes to finally come up and load after I clicked on the link!  Yes it is usually slow...but not that slow.  It did eventually come up though.
 

Offline drussell

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1395 on: November 01, 2018, 03:47:35 am »
Works also fine for me...(but slow as usual)

Slow is putting it mildly!  It took 7 minutes to finally come up and load after I clicked on the link!  Yes it is usually slow...but not that slow.  It did eventually come up though.

You folks might want to check into your upstream provider's network connectivity.

It loads instantly from here, checked from three different upstream providers.

The ping times do go up by about 200 ms as soon as it gets to China (normal for China) but it works fine.

Perhaps your ISP (or government or something) is manipulating your traffic in some way?
 

Offline monacco

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1396 on: November 01, 2018, 09:16:17 pm »
Yes, the red LED is lit up
No, on none PC shown up in the device manager, either with installed driver already or new PC for this device.

So far only tested under Win10/x64 but (when it still worked) it could be installed on three differnt PCs without any issues.

It should show up even without a driver.  It sounds faulty to me.

This is a long shot but have you tried making sure that the USB cable is fully inserted and even swapped it for another ?

Although it is already a while ago it may be interesting for the solution of this issue: it was indeed broken.  :-BROKE
The seller replaced the defective in warranty and it is working incl. last update as expected.  :-+
 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1397 on: November 03, 2018, 12:56:58 am »
I'm trying to program a ST M27C1024-10F1 chip.   Do  I need an adapter to program this chip?  Or will the MiniPro TL866 be able to program this chip on it's own?
 

Offline drussell

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1398 on: November 03, 2018, 01:15:58 am »
I'm trying to program a ST M27C1024-10F1 chip.   Do  I need an adapter to program this chip?  Or will the MiniPro TL866 be able to program this chip on it's own?

The -10F1 version means it should be the DIP version with the window for UV erasure, 100ns, standard temperature....  Since it is one of the DIP versions, it will plug right into the ZIF socket on the programmer.
 
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Offline BrianG61UK

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Re: EEVblog #411 - MiniPro TL866 Universal Programmer Review
« Reply #1399 on: November 04, 2018, 01:16:13 pm »
seems like autoelectric.cn has gone awol. saves on making updates eh?

I've bookmarked http://www.xgecu.com/en/
which is working well for me.
 


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