ArduinoBT setup

I can find out if my ArduinoBT board is powered properly.
I know this are very newbie question, but please don't laugh :wink:
When I power the board which LED should light up? which should not?
Should I have any feedback after I press the reset button?
Should I see any feedback from the bluetooth module that tells me it is working (during upload)?

Thanks for you help!

Those are, in fact, excellent questions and point out how bad our documentation is for the Arduino BT. I've recently done write-ups of the Diecimila and XBee shield; I think the Arduino BT is next. Until then, I hope someone with more experience with the board than me can help you out.

i have got problems setting up arduino bt, too. it does not work at all. i tried it with 3 windows pcs and one macbook. they are recognizing the board. but they do not find any services.

on os x there is an error while scanning the services. but afterwards i can setup a serial port. in arduino i get port in use exceptions.

any suggestions? i am afraid that the board is damaged.

thanks

michael

i tested it with a second arduino bt with the same problems.

problem solved: it works with arduino 0007 software. with 0009 on os x on an intel macbook it is impossible to upload to arduino bt.

are there any known bugs?

greetings

michael

Here it works, on OS X, intel, and with Arduino 0009.
I think the timing is more tight. I allways press reset on the board just after I pressed the upload button.

Regarding services: My Mac also doesn't discover a service. But after pairing I have the new serial device "/dev/cu.ARDUINOBT-BluetoothSeri-1". That's all what's needed for the Arduino IDE. In the Bluetooth preference panel you can see the connection state of "ARDUINOBT" under "Devices". It must be alive i.e. "yes". The link itself is only active during an actual transmission. You can also check this. "Connection active" should switch from "no" to "yes" during an upload or any serial monitor action.

@Inferno:
The LEDs on ArduinoBT only show the power state. If you want to know if the Board is really alive you can put an LED between digital pin 13 and GND (the shorter LED wire goes there).
After a reset this LED flashes quickly three times. This shows you that the Boatloader is working and waiting for an upload.

Hope this helps,
Oli

Thanks for your suggestion! it really helped!
It gave me the feedback to understand that, like in michael case, uploading with Arduino 009 does not work: after reset, the board wait for 5-6 seconds and then start a led-flashing script (uploaded by the manufacturer, I guess), while Arduino 009 remains blocked.

But with Arduino 007 everything works flawlessly.

:slight_smile:

What happens when you try it with Arduino 0009?

Nothing happens. Arduino 0009 tries to start a connection with the board but halt indefinitely (or until I manually close the connection).
As I said in my previous post, the boot loader wait for a few seconds and then starts the script.
It seems like they do not communicate at all.

I am using arduino 0008 and sometimes timing of the reset and upload are critical. After lots of programming you know how the BT icon in the menubar changes. There is a connection then it is gone for moment and the connection is there again. If you start a BT program with a LED flash on pin 13 for instance you will notice when programming doesn't work, the LED will start it's pattern and the (second) BT connection is gone. But arduino will try again. If you press the reset button again there is a chance the program will be uploaded.

Thanks - this thread also helped me. Connecting to Arduino BT with OX10.4.10 (PPC) and Arduino 09, resetting the Arduino about half a second afterward worked.