WINC1500 & Programmer Not Responding Moderators: adafruit_support_bill, adafruit

[tpylkko]

I need help in debugging this issue. I have a a feather m0 experss with winc1501 wifi module from adafruit. It is possible to send programs with arduino IDE (1.8.9 on latest Fedora) over to the board and it runs them perfectly fine. However, the firmware updater tool does not run, it only complains that the programmer is not responding (which is the updater sketch from the WiFi101 library). The library also has a checkversion sketch which I can load and run and it reports the firmware to be two revisions behind. However, the updater refuses to communicate. I have tried adding the required setpins command in the setup function of the updater sketch, but it does not change anything. I don't see how to get further information about what is failing, nothing is coming out of the serial port at the correct baud.

[adafruit_support_mike]

What version of firmware does the WINC1500 have now?

If it's 19.5.2, you don't need to do the upgrade.. in fact, in rare cases the update to 19.5.4 can brick the WINC1500.

[tpylkko]

Appears to be 19.4.4. So you would say that updating it is not necessary, despite the check sketch saying so?

kernel log has a:

cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: failed to set dtr/rts
cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: failed to set dtr/rts


is the latest version 19.6.1?

[tpylkko]

Well, I blacklisted everything by adafruit vendor id in udev rules for a group that the user is in. I say this because there is a guide on your webpage which tells the user to download some rules and update udev with them. These rules, however use a group called "adm" which I don't have at all (but perhaps it is standard in Ubuntu). I changed it to dialout and added myself to this.

After all of this, I changed the pins to the correct ones in the updater sketch and it worked. I think it is a bit weird that it would allow to use a serial monitor, upload stuff and what not, yet the firmware update would not work. However, some how this is the case.

[adafruit_support_mike]

Appears to be 19.4.4. So you would say that updating it is not necessary, despite the check sketch saying so?

Yes. Based on our experience, the message from the sketch is there to encourage people to update, but doesn't mean there's a compatibility problem with the previous firmware.

kernel log has a:

cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: failed to set dtr/rts
cdc_acm 1-3:1.0: failed to set dtr/rts


is the latest version 19.6.1?

No, that's the microcontroller. The WINC1500 can't communicate with the computer directly, so all data has to go through the microcontroller.

[tpylkko]

Yes. That is what I meant. I did not mean that the winc can talk to the kernel. I meant that the communication over USB with the computer works in a unpredictable way without adding the user to a group which has rights set in the udev rule. If it is not configured properly, the writing to the device works at times, but at times not. After the rule is set, it just always works immediately.

[adafruit_support_mike]

Yep, that's a side effect of the 'nix permissions system and USB stack.