[RiffleBeta] New photos! Mac driver not working, need help

[Liz Barry]

Hi Riffle mentors, 

Please take a look at the photos i added in the first 4 pages of the Getting Started doc 

I had to stop there because the driver issue is indeed an issue, at least for mac people. Thanks in advance for any help. Here's some stuff I tried yesterday after installing the driver listed in the Getting Started doc didn't automatically access the RIFFLE through the serial port, which meant i couldn't reprogram the RIFFLE in arduino:

On Tue, May 3, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Don Blair <donb...@pvos.org> wrote:

https://www.reddit.com/r/arduino/comments/3dfr2e/ch340g_arduinos_with_osx_el_capitan/

i downloaded and saw this links to the same file as Don linked to in RIFFLE getting started (both modified Nov 2 2015) so i didn't pursue this. 

On Tue, May 3, 2016 at 10:07 PM, Don Blair <donb...@pvos.org> wrote:

http://kig.re/2014/12/31/how-to-use-arduino-nano-mini-pro-with-CH340G-on-mac-osx-yosemite.html

I first tried the "older driver" version at the bottom of this page, including the rebooting into Recovery mode and disabling kext. It did not work, so rebooted & reenabled kext and moved on. 

I tried the download link http://kig.re/downloads/CH34x_Install.zip and when i ran his terminal command "ls /dev/tty*" i did indeed see a new driver listed in terminal /dev/tty.wchusbserialfa130 :

Confirmed my System Preferences were set correctly. 

I do not know what 'system report" is so i ignored this step: 

Open ‘System Report’->Hardware->USB, on the right side “USB Device Tree” there will be device named “Vendor-Specific Device” and check if the Current is normal. If the steps upper don’t work at all, please try to install the package again.

Moving on, at this point when i open Arduino, the Port is set: 

However, upload did not work. At least it didn't work differently than the first time: 

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Liz Barry
director of community development
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[Chris Fastie]

There is some pretty detailed troubleshooting stuff at Arduino: https://www.arduino.cc/en/Guide/Troubleshooting2#toc8

I got the same error Liz is getting when I tried to upload to an Arduino from a new computer the other day. It eventually worked and there are so many variables that I don't know what I did to fix it. I think having the Arduino connected and powered up before the Arduino IDE program starts might have been involved in getting it to work. 

Chris

[Liz Barry]

Thanks Chris, that is really detailed!

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Liz Barry
director of community development
@publiclab

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[Mathew Lippincott]

The serial problems Liz is reporting are a bootloader issue.  The Riffle needs an Uno bootloader flashed onto it.  I'm doing that to all the Riffles here in Portland before they ship, as its a quick process.

https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/installing-an-arduino-bootloader

The CH340 chip clearly is not a stable working serial to USB device on Mac, as the method to get it working has changed with every Mac OS update, I've gone through three iterations in the past 6 months:

The Serial driver that worked for me this time is the slightly older one.  This process got the serial driver working on mac:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Arduino-Nano-CH340/

Previously, this driver had worked for me:

http://raysfiles.com/drivers/ch341ser_mac.zip 

before that, the driver linked from the instructable had worked without any command line OS changes.

http://www.wch.cn/download/CH341SER_ZIP.html

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Mathew Lippincott

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[Don Blair]

Awesome, Mathew figured it out!

Looks like it might be a good idea to reconsider using the CH340 chip in the design (or at least keep track of a Mac OS X version -- driver version matrix). 

[Scott Eustis]

thanks, mat, chris



s

Scott Eustis
504 484 9599


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[Patrick Hixenbaugh]

Hey all, question for you. On the instructables, it describes using the driver:

"You will also notice that once in a while (maybe 1 time of 3) you will get errors when uploading but you do not have to care, the code will usually upload either way."

Has this been something people have noticed? We might need to keep a known issues section of documentation somewhere if so. It doesn't sound like a big deal thought, thankfully.

>Looks like it might be a good idea to reconsider using the CH340 chip in the design (or at least keep track of a Mac OS X version -- driver version matrix). 

I like the idea of keeping track of which driver to use (and provide by rehosting it on PL?). If using the CH340 for USB to Serial is a big cost saving, then it should let us keep the price point low for all those citizen watershed groups and other people who are self-funding. How much does it lower the price compared to alternatives?

Thanks,
Patrick

[Mathew Lippincott]

I've found that I get an upload error 1/5 tries with the CH340 on Mac, usually right after (first 5 seconds) I've plugged the board in.  If I just re-run it it works fine. 

I think the CH340 was a clever idea to save several dollars on the design that has been more problematic than expected, I agree that although a cost savings it probably isn't worth it for a production board. it costs roughly 75 cents.

The two canonical options are:

$4.50 FTDI FT232RL a proprietary device with closed source code, as used on the Arduino Duemilanove or

$7.50 ATMEGA16U2 with open source firmware for serial to USB.  This is what the Arduino Uno v3 uses. For small runs of hardware this option gets expensive since we have to flash the ATMEGA16U2. The chip costs $4.50 + ~$3 in labor to flash.  This would be the better "open hardware" choice, but it is probably not affordable. 

In quantities of 100, the riffles cost $35.50 to manufacture right now. replacing the CH340 will increase the manufacturing cost 10-20% and the retail price 15-30%.

[George M. Gallant, Jr.]

There is a third option and that is to remove the CH340G completely and have the end user interface with a USB to serial adapter. Both options could be on the same board, 6-pin header or USB.

George