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3D RoboticsPermalink Reply by Chris Anderson on June 27, 2009 at 6:54pm

Byran,

That's my board. It's a prototype Sparkfun FTDI board, and there was a PCB error, which is what the red wire is fixing. We don't know why it's not working with the config utility on the 328 board. Please be patient while we try to figure it out.

Remember, this is an open source hardware project. These sort of bumps are pretty normal. We'll get there.

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AdminPermalink Reply by Thomas J Coyle III on June 27, 2009 at 6:55pm

Bryan,

I believe that this Sparkfun FTDI board is an older 3.3v board as it is green in color. A red board would indicate a newer revision of the board as Sparkfun usually uses green first then blue and finally red I believe.

My Sparkfun FTDI 3.3v board is red and where the green board appears to have "RTS" in the lower right hand corner, my board says "DTR".

Also, the red wire in the picture appears to be attached to pins 2 and 3 which are DTR and RTS respectively. Additionally the green board has the sequence 3.3v, RXI, and TXD where my red board has 3.3V, TXD and RXI.
Very interesting.

I have not tried my red FTDI 3.3v board yet. Maybe it will work where as the green boards had to be modified to work correctly?

Comments?

Regards,
TCIII

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Permalink Reply by Paul Har on June 28, 2009 at 9:11am

I dont have this board with my FTDI cable, but the cable works except for the config untility

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Permalink Reply by Bryan Cuervo on June 28, 2009 at 9:27am

Sorry Guys,
I was getting a little frustrated last night. So close to flying! I'm sure Chris and Jordi will get this straitened out. There's an old saying about production. There is cheap, fast and quality but you can never have all three at the same time. I'll just have to be patient because a low cost, high quality Ardupilot will be worth the wait!

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Permalink Reply by Brent West on June 30, 2009 at 5:15pm

Now this isn’t fair. I just ordered another FTDI 3.3 board from Spark fun over the weekend because I thought that maybe I had damaged mine in one way or another. Had my doubts because I’m reading that many other guys are have the same problem as me with uploading the software and using the utility.
Now beginning yesterday or today, Spark fun is recommending the USB connector that has been available through DIY Drones.
My question: Is this cable the cure all to everyone’s issues?

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Permalink Reply by Damon Pipenberg on June 30, 2009 at 5:48pm

I have the TTL-232R-3V3 cable and I cannot get it to work for Arduino or the config utility. I did not purchase this cable from this site, I just had it laying around, but I am pretty sure it is the same, unless FTDI has updated the internal IC. I also have a Sparkfun 5V FTDI breakout and it works just about perfectly with Arduino and the config utility.

I would advise any of you with problems to try this workaround: create a jumper to connect pins 1-5 of the FTDI cable to the ArduPilot - don't connect pin 6 (green wire, DTR/RTS depending on the FTDI cable you have). Then, when using the config utility for read/write, press the read or write button, then wait until the blue progress bar reaches 100%. When it does, press the reset button on your ArduPilot. It should then read or write correctly. If this does not work with the shield connected, try it with it disconnected. Let me know how it works for you.

My advice would be to wait a little while and see how this is resolved before buying another cable. I'm sure it won't take Chris and Jordi too long to get it sorted out.

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Permalink Reply by Reto on July 2, 2009 at 2:29pm

I'll try that tomorrow and report back.

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Permalink Reply by Reto on July 2, 2009 at 3:09pm

Couldn't resist trying out your pin 6 test right away! I could write my 3 first WP with the Config Utility, shield on or off, GPS and Xbee off. But I couldn't read them back to be sure they were in the EEprom. So I switched on my Tx and brand new ArduStation. In autopilot mode, the WP flag went to #1 and distance to WP1 was there, aileron servo moving. At least I know my ArduPilot is working right. thanks for the trick. i wouldn't do it like that again, so I'll wait for my DIYdrones FTDI cable, and for Chris and Jordi's solution to cirumnavigate the Sparkfun FTDI problem.

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Permalink Reply by Jerry LeDrew on July 5, 2009 at 4:51pm

Hi Damon....
I just tried your suggestion about pin 6 .... Supprise it almost works ....
I can read ok but when I try to add waypoints it only adds thr Lat. portion ....
Did you get any of that ....My Location is 49.931296 N ...-55.661952 W ....
I am not sure of the format for entering them ....
De VO1ET Jerry

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AdminPermalink Reply by Thomas J Coyle III on July 2, 2009 at 3:24pm

James,

I can tell you that the Adafruit FTDI cable works fine with the ArduStation serial interface.

I plan to try it with the Ardupilot/Shield board combination tomorrow.

Regards,
TCIII

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Permalink Reply by Reto on July 2, 2009 at 3:32pm

Just to inform that I loaded the code to the ArduStation with my Sparkfun 3.3v FTDI breakout board today without a problem, even without taking out the Xbee!

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Permalink Reply by Brent West on July 1, 2009 at 11:37pm

He fellows,
For those of you that are still having problems uploading the software, I think I’ve found the fix.
I just read on another post about one of us had found a bad solder joint on the headers and so I went to double check mine. The solder joints looked good but I found the DTS or GRN line still didn’t have continuity point to point between the headers.
At the risk of sounding obscene, the pins being provided are almost too small for the female header. That’s right, she wants it fatter! I tinned the pin and even bent it slightly, (all of them) and now I can consistently upload the program through the shield board.
I tried the utility program and I could see it talking that I haven’t seen before, but still got “something’s wrong” and “can’t read” errors, but that’s ok, I’m going back to the manual.
Good Luck

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