My PICO keeps on flashing red-green, where can I find some help?

[espruino-discuss3]

Posted at 2015-11-16 by UliMerkel

Just got my PICO and tried to use it under Win7.

Inserted it with pressed button, but it looks like it continues flashing red-green for eternity.

I scanne documentation and web, but have not found a clue.

Is there something I can check fo find some step-to-(baby)step help?

[espruino-discuss3]

Posted at 2015-11-16 by @gfwilliams

What happens if you plug it in without the button pressed and follow the rest of the tutorial? It should 'just work'.

The flashing lights only happen when the Pico is in firmware update mode (which you get to by plugging in with the button pressed). The update is a good thing to do, but to prove it's all working ok it's best to just try and connect with the Web IDE first.

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Posted at 2015-11-16 by UliMerkel

When I connected it the first time, after the connect it have not been able to send commands to the board.

So I found it a good thing to update the firmware.

Looks like I made it now, but I still have not seen the espruino welcome logo.

Under settings, the board is recognised now so I think I can spend some evening on it.

Thanks Gordon, for your quick response,
Greetings from Frankfurt/Germany, Uli

P.S: I tried to start with WinXP, but could not download a proper Virtual COM port driver package version 1.3

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Posted at 2015-11-16 by @allObjects

...I noticed that with combination of most recent updated parts - Chrome (on OS X), Espruino, and Espruino - something is not as clean working anymore as before, especially after having saved a piece of code. 'Removing' that piece of saved code with reset() and saving no code - empty editor / right hand side - it is still fishy. Empty program still saves 800+ bytes and pluging Pico into USB wants to output something (loading message). Connecting will not always be successful, and when seemingly successful - indicated by the green connected icon - console (input) is not always connected, logo not always shown, nor will uploading - sending - code to the board make the logo show... Sometimes upload is extremely slow - see green progress bar at the bottom right in the IDE. Entering reset() may trigger the logo... and the uplaod. Recovering from not connected even though showing connected requires sometimes a restart of the browser. I guess it has something to do with the access of the serial (through USB) by Chrome.

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Posted at 2015-11-16 by @gfwilliams

but could not download a proper Virtual COM port driver package version 1.3

Was it a dead link? Anything I can do to help out? XP should still work fine.

@allObjects the Espruino won't output the welcome logo (apart from after reset() if you have saved code to it). It's to help avoid the problem where print statements fill the output buffer and cause Espruino to wait for you to run a program on the PC.

If there's some other problem (like you mentioned involving browser restart) please could you try and come up with some repeatable steps that can get it to happen reliably and create a new topic about it? I can hopefully debug it then.

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Posted at 2015-11-16 by @allObjects

@gfwilliams, did not methodically corner the issue (yet)... The absence of the logo confused me... and even more so since I do not know how to save a 'really empty state' which - then of course - would return to initial / factory state of Espruino, and begin to show the logo (once in a while going back to reading the doc would help - RTD / TL;DR; symptom creep in over time ;(

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Posted at 2015-11-17 by UliMerkel

Hi Gordon,

when I go to the drivers download page for STSW-STM32102,
all I can get is the 1.4.0 version. Installing this, I see drivers for Win7 and Win8 only.
The docu says it takes a 1.3 for WinXP, but I couldn't find where to download this package.

@allObjects: it looks I was confused because I have not seen a logo at first connect. I attended a presentation by Nico Koebler and always seen the logo (maybe only bad memory)

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Posted at 2015-11-17 by @gfwilliams

That's an odd one - usually you should see the logo the first time you connect... However if you connect when the lights are flashing, you won't get anything.

Thanks for the tip about 1.3 - I'll see if I have it downloaded anywhere and will change the links on the QuickStart page.

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Posted at 2015-11-17 by UliMerkel

After the first connect has not shown the logo, I used the "flashing-leds" as a "hail mary" option.
It's so easy to intimidate a newbie like me when the hardware remains silent.
TIA for your 1.3 effort, Uli

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Posted at 2015-11-17 by @gfwilliams

I'll update the Quick Start on the website, but version 1.3.1 is available here now: https://github.com/espruino/EspruinoDocs/blob/master/files/stm32_vcp_1.3.1.zip

and should hopefully work for you on XP.

Just to check: did you actually try and install the drivers from 1.4.0 on your XP PC? It seems strange that XP drivers would actually have been removed.

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Posted at 2015-11-17 by UliMerkel

Hi Gordon, I tried it on XP first, because this is the box for my experiments.

Will give it a try if I can install the driver on XP now. It's OK and connect positive.

Thanks for your help, Uli