EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Mine is installed with Matrix driver and the board is connected directly to mainboard without hub.

I will check when I'm back at home if WinUsb devicedriver is also installed.
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Benj »

Hello,

I've just double checked by uninstalling the WinUSB device and driver files, restarting my PC and installing via Windows update again. Programming and test mode still fully operational in Flowcode v6.0.7.

Next I will remove the device driver from my home machine just to double check we are not in some way being shielded from the latest Windows Update updates via our local server.

USB hubs may be installed on your computers motherboard so be aware that different USB ports may behave differently depending on how the internal wiring has been done, if you have issues I would go round trying each USB port to see if some are better than others.

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Deleted ...
Last edited by Crenwick on Sat Apr 26, 2014 1:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Bernard

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Hi all,

I'm not sure of this statement but today it started working when I used Matrix power supply switched to 9V.
First times I set it to 7.5V power and also to USB power. Is it possible that the V9 board turns unstable when not powered enough ?

I'm working this weekend on two projects so I will for sure write a lot of times PIC's.



Regards,
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

2 points.

1. I can't seem to find the latest version of mLoader, I'm still stuck with the version that gives the errors most people are saying are solved. on top of that, I downloaded and installed a demo of the latest Flowcode, just so I could try the mLoader component of it, and get the same issues. Navigating the site seems to get me a 404 a lot, and The mLoader download on the EB006 page still seems to be dated 4th of march.

Can you post a download link to the latest version of mLoader please?

2. This is the file I'm trying to download to the PIC in mLoader, it works perfectly fine in PPPV3 on my EB006V8, but doesn't seem to work in mLoader on the same EB006V8, dispite it telling me it programmed correctly (Possibly a headder issue?), and it doesn't work at all with the EB006V9, with the errors i've stated previously.
pic16f84a_test.HEX
(72 Bytes) Downloaded 375 times
The program is simple, press a button on port B, it lights up on port A.

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Hi,

Sorry I have no more 16F84A in house. Can you recompile for 16F88 or 16F628 then I can test your HEX.

The driver I used for V9 is http://www.matrixmultimedia.com/resourc ... php?id=744

And the mloader is the one loaded with FC6.0.7 but also tested with http://www.matrixmultimedia.com/resourc ... .php?id=12
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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

One remark about the power supply !

I tested now the board in USB and Extenal Power mode. The power supply is the one supplied by Matrix and is adjustable (3/4.5/6/7.5/9/13.5V).

When I tested my project (True RMS Voltage sensor with 16F887/EB005LCD/EB004LED/EB007SWITCHES+breadboard) I also followed the powerline VCC with use of the USB power and with use of EP, and here are the measures :

USB without load : 4.75V
USB loaded with project : 4.6V (I presume the length of the USB cable can be an issue)
EP set to 7.5V : 4.5V
EP set to 9V : 5V

Why did I set the EP to 7.5V ? Well just because it's described in the datasheet.
DS Extract.jpg
DS Extract.jpg (89.04 KiB) Viewed 16043 times
So I checked the circuit diagram and the reason of this low voltage is very clear ! Between the power jack and the 7805 reg. there is a rectifier bridge to prevent reverse polarity I suppose, but the bridge is also responsible from a voltage drop of 1.2V (2 diodes) so the 7805 receives only 6.3V on his input and became unstable. When the EP is set to 9V then the 7805 receives 7.8V at input and that's OK ! Now the 7805 delivers a perfect stable 5V :wink:

So, It should be good I think to mod the datasheet.
I can't confirm but my two cents is that the charge pump to program the PIC's can also become unstable if VCC is bad.
What do you think ?

Regards,
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

I don't have any 88 or 628. I do have some 877, an 877A and 887, and some 883s, plus the 1937 that came with the EB006V9. That's my entire selection.

Also, those that you linked are the same versions of the files I'm already using.

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

bobingabout wrote:I don't have any 88 or 628. I do have some 877, an 877A and 887, and some 883s, plus the 1937 that came with the EB006V9. That's my entire selection.

Also, those that you linked are the same versions of the files I'm already using.
887 and 1937 is also good for me :wink:
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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Hi all,

I tested a simple Led blinker prog with all the PIC's I have here and only one didn't accept to program (fortunately I have two of them so I crosschecked) but has nothing to do with V9 because FC6 is also unable to program it with my V7 board !

What I tested

12F675 -- OK
16F88 -- OK
16F628 -- NOK / Maybe a problem in 16F628.fcdx ??? Can this be checked ?
16F887 -- OK
16F1937 -- OK
18LF2455 -- OK
18F4455 -- OK

That's enough for taoday :wink:

Regards,
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

This should be the same program for the 1937, I get the same problems that I get with the 84A.
Attachments
1937test.HEX
(152 Bytes) Downloaded 277 times

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

bobingabout wrote:This should be the same program for the 1937, I get the same problems that I get with the 84A.
Your file is ok on my board
test.jpg
test.jpg (68.66 KiB) Viewed 16026 times
What I saw is that the error "Unknown chip type in data file" also appears when there is no PIC on board, it's like the board doesn't see the PIC !
Bernard

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Here I am again !

Well this morning I rolled my eyes when I used my ZIF interface with a 16F1937. Mloader doesn't recognize anymore the 16F1937 :roll: . So I tested a 16F887 with ZIF and YES it's working !!!

For information when 16F1937 directly on socket of EB006 then ok. I began to scratch my head, should it be a timing problem :?:

So i connected my DSO to the ICSP points (VPP/CLK/DATA/VDD) and checked the sequences. I made some screen dumps to let you see what I saw.

First, view of clock/data with V9 board
EB006-V9.gif
EB006-V9.gif (18.07 KiB) Viewed 15994 times
Next, same but with V7 board
EB006-V7.gif
EB006-V7.gif (17.86 KiB) Viewed 15994 times
As you can see the period is MUCH bigger on V9 (40us vs 2us), so witch one is the best ? I plugged my ICSP programmer on the V9 board (witch switch of J12/J13/J14) and ..... He use the same time settings as my V7 board !!! (2us period) and I succesfully program the 16F1937 via my ZIF adapter.

Here is a picture of my ZIF adapter plugged on the EB006-V9 board
setup.jpg
setup.jpg (124.92 KiB) Viewed 15994 times
Don't know if the timing (40us period) is "hard" programmed in the V9 board or adjustable in mloader but I'm pretty sure that a check of this should be necessary :wink:

Regards,
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Benj »

Hello,

That speed difference is interesting. I will have a tinker here with the v9 firmware and see what it's doing to make it so slow. No idea why a slower signal would effect the chip in the ZIF socket.

Looks like it's hard programmed in at the moment. I will have a play here and see if reducing the delays has any effect on programming a chip in a ZIF socket.

Edit: Reducing the delays made no difference, still unable to program with a ZIF. In previous boards we used a 5V USB microcontroller to do the programming, now we use a 3V3 chip with NPN transistors to allow the signals to go up to 5V I wonder if it is the voltage rise speed that is causing issues with the ZIF during programming.

Edit: Reducing the pull up resistors also didn't help to resolve the problem. Curious, wonder what's causing it?

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Hi Ben,

Just has a look at the chip U4 on the board (4053), is it not better to ground non used inputs (Z0/Z1/C)
Can you explain why divide PROGABC by 2 with R8/16 ?
What's the utility of U4 (switching CLK/DATA to 40p Header ???)

Regards,

[EDIT]

Ben,

I think I found a problem !

I checked the input/output signals on the 4053 and the data line (Prog_X1 -- RB7_USB) seems to be truncated !

Look at the screen dumps :

Yellow = Output to PIC RB7_USB
Blue = Input that comes from collector Q5 (pin 13 U4)
Purple = Yellow - Blue
IN_OUT_DATA.gif
IN_OUT_DATA.gif (18.69 KiB) Viewed 15964 times
I did the same for CLK and seems ok
IN_OUT_CLK.gif
IN_OUT_CLK.gif (21 KiB) Viewed 15964 times
And also had an "unrecognized chip error" one time in mloader when my probe was on collector of Q5.
Bernard

Flowcode 6 / EB006-V9

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Benj »

Hello,

U4 connects the target programming pins to the E-blocks port or to the programming IC depending on the current operation. Basically stopping the E-block connection from interfering with re-programming.

We have used this setup of u4 on our boards for years without issue and think it is advised to leave unused pins disconnected.

The Prog_X1 signal is bi-directional, It looks like your scope is showing the output and input modes of the X1 signal. The clock signal on the other hand is only unidirectional.

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

Ooops ! I was little bit to fast :oops:

Another thing I saw is that PPP_PGD_O on the side of R92 was sometimes "dirty" at low level. Didn't had time to check the output properties of RA1/RPI17.

Sorry,
Bernard

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Benj »

Ok thanks very much, if you spot anything else then let me know :)

I have had a bit of a breakthrough and managed to solve the issue where the driver won't install on XP systems. Basically it needs an earlier release of the WinUSB DLL files so I have created a second device driver for XP systems with the correct DLLs.

Updated driver with files for XP available from the usual place: http://www.matrixmultimedia.com/resourc ... php?id=744

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

I'm now checking the noise on the power lines and checking why this noise goes up when programming.

After analyzing the Charge Pump Circuitry I have some questions (sorry for this :oops: )

1- Do you know that when the CPC is idle there is a voltage of 37V over C18 ?
2- Shouldn't be better to add a resistor in the L1/Q4 line to limit the current ?
3 - To limit the voltage over C18 a zener maybe ?

C18 is on my board warm...

Sorry Ben for all this questions :wink:
Bernard

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Benj »

Hello,

The MCLR voltage needs to rise fast or it doesn't go into programming mode correctly, The voltage across C18 shouldn't be rising as high as 37V though so yes maybe a zener here would help things but only by dumping a certain amount of current which is probably not what we want. Had another play with switching off the charge pump and it drops to 4.7V across C18 but then the re-programming won't work as the charge pump needs time to build the VPP programming voltage. A current limiting resistor as you suggested might work to overcome the issue.

In practise the charge pump circuit as is has been in place since v7 of the EB006 the only real change is the new 3V3 microcontroller and the additional circuitry to allow 3V3 signals to switch 5V signals.

The fact that your C18 is getting warm/hot is probably not good though, what PSU voltage are you using?

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

I'm using a 9V PSU for the reason I explain above (bridge rectifier drops 1.2V) and 7805 became unstable when PSU at 7.5V input.

This will not make a difference I think because L1 is connected to VCC (5V) from the 7805. Maybe connect L1 to Vregin ?
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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

Firstly, Thankyou Ben for looking at XP drivers again, I'll take a look into it at some point soon. (I've been busy this week, and havn't had the chance to do much with my EBlocks board.)


Secondly, Given the way the 78 and 79 series of regulators work, they drop a minimum of about 3V to produce the desired voltage. This works the same on the 7805 for 5V, and other versions such as the 7812 for 12V. So you would need to be putting at least 8V into the 7805 for it to function properly. if you're setting your PSU to 9V, and dropping 1.2 across the bridge, that's 7.8V, which is a little on the low side for the 7805. So 9V is what i'd call the absolute minimum stable voltage.

For something I was building, I replaced the 7805 in my design with a LM2576t-5, it's a 5 pin switch mode power regulator, which requires an inductor, and diode as extra components, plus a much larger capacitor on the output (1000uF). This thing accepts a similar minimum voltage, but unlike the 7805 which drops excess voltage by disipating it as heat, causing a lot of wasted power, and a hot regulator with higher voltages, the 2576 will reduce the voltage to 5 volts by rapidly turning it on and off, and smoothing out the result afterwards (hence needing an inductor and big capacitor), and will safely operate at voltages as high as 36V without getting very hot at all.

I personally used the 2576 because of availability, however, there are alternatives available that include the diode and inductor built into the chip, needing only the large capacitor on the output. Due to the ammount of complaints I see on the forums about components getting hot when running from the AC adaptor, this is a change I recomend be looked into for future boards.

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

Okay, double post I know, but... my other post was long enough.

Tried the XP drivers. I had too force it to use them as with the previous version, however, this time, they worked! Thanks ben!

I then proceeded to use the latest mLoader (which I had been using anyway, but I re-downloaded it again just to be sure) and once again, receaved the "Unknown chip in data file" error, and "Flash memory not varified" error.

At this point I am running the board from USB power... as the odd shape of the PSU causes i to take up 2 of my valuble sockets to use.

Just for the purpose of testing, I plugged it in and set the board for external power supply, set to 12V (because it's what I'm used to using on my V2), and... it worked!

it still says "Unknown chip in data file", but if you specifically tell it 16F84A, it programs without a problem.

This so far is using mLoader directly.

When I try to link it to ASM:IDE, I get a whole bunch of other errors... ASM:IDE is part of the programming suite from the old V2 boards (As stated, we are considering mLoader, but it's all about budget, we can't buy anything untill August).


Can you give me any information about how to send command line instructions to mLoader?

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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by Crenwick »

The command line I use for test is "mloader -chip 16F887 test.hex"

About the 7805 a Vin of 7.8V is fine as you have a Vdrop of 2V over the regulator. I tested this with a load of 500mA without problem (Vout = stable 5V)
The only "known" problem of the 7805 is that he's getting hot due to this 2V drop ( linear reg). A switched model like you proposed should be better actually.
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Re: EB-006-00-9 Driver issue

Post by bobingabout »

Crenwick wrote:Do you know that when the CPC is idle there is a voltage of 37V over C18 ?
...
C18 is on my board warm...
Mine is the same, I just measured.

Considering this is a 25V rated capacitor, this is a problem that should be addressed, even if at the very least the capacitor is replaced with a 35V or 50V alternative in later builds.

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