Dear all,
I have several genuine Arduino UNO and Mega 2560 MCU's and a clone of each.
Recently I accidentally shorted the +5 V line to ground on the UNO clone (yeah - I know it was dumb but it was very late and I was tired - guess there is a moral in their somewhere??).
Anyway, to cut to the chase the UNO clone has the CH340T chip and since shorting the +5V line it no longer runs any programs - it goes through the motions of loading a sketch but then nothing runs!
Prior to shorting it the UNO clone ran everything my genuine UNO ran so there were no problems with it prior to this event!
I have checked all of the lines on the clone and all pins are showing their correct voltages.
This is about the limit of my abilities at this stage but I have two questions: can the clone with the CH340T be reprogrammed? And if so, how should I go about this?
Or - a third question is - is my UNO clone "UTS" and has gone to god as a consequence????
Why do I have these clones one might rightly ask? Well, this particular UNO clone has both male and female header pins which are tremendously beneficial and are therefore a definate advantage over the genuine UNO! Any plans for the genuine article to incorporate this functionality - I believe it would increase UNO sales tremendously, if it was???
Anyway appreciate any help on this possible programming matter, please.
By the way please remember I am a total newby to programming chips etc - so I would greatly appreciate not using and techie jargon in any reply.
One final comment - the whole time I was typing this question all of the text decenders were missing; that is until just now when I started writing this comment???? Very weird!!
I have checked all of the lines on the clone and all pins are showing their correct voltages.
This is about the limit of my abilities at this stage but I have two questions: can the clone with the CH340T be reprogrammed? And if so, how should I go about this?
If your time is worth anything, toss it... unless the clone has a -PU DIP for the 328. If it is surface mounted, SMT, then save yourself a headache, spend $3.21 USD to buy another.
Thanks guys for your replies:
The Uno was being powered through my laptop USB connection and as best I can remember it was being powered by +5V supply (next to the 3.3V line in the Power Section ot the UNO). The GND connection was via one of the two adjacent GND headers.
I can load the blink program and it gives the 'AVRdude done - thanks' note but the LED on 13 does not illuminate or respond to this program??
The suspect board is fitted with the Atmega 328P-PU removable chip and I am thinking of swapping the good removable chip from the genuine Arduino which also has exactly the same chip and trying this in the suspect board and/or the reverse - placing the suspect board chip in the genuine board and seeing if it runs???
Is either or both of these a good or bad idea - could doing either or both kill my good chip???
vgtlcs:
Is either or both of these a good or bad idea - could doing either or both kill my good chip???
Very unlikely - if you are powering it by USB, it is virtually impossible to damage the chips as nothing will generate more than 5V, or more than 500 mA. Then again, it also follows that merely shorting the 5V pin on the UNO to the GND pin on the UNO should not permanently damage anything other than presumably the power changeover circuitry whilst USB powered either, and if that was damaged you could not upload code.
I have no idea what an "AVRdude done - thanks" message means; I have never seen such - are you using the Arduino IDE?
Yep - certainly am! version 1.5.7 r2 or r3 - can't remember which.
I am simply amazed by your comment you have never seen these words??? This RED text appears in the lower window below the code window following compiling EVERY ARDUINO PROGRAM I have ever run - including all of the programs run with the genuine UNO and Mega 2560???? refer attached pic.
This red text seems to correspond to a line of each step in the running program - there are (and always have been) a multitude of red text lines (all showing numbers in []'s for each and every program run!
This red text always ends with the above "avrdude" statement when the program compiles OK - or a cryptic explanation of any problem areas encountered in this program, should this occur??
You are not the first person to comment as you have when I have mentioned this "happening" in previous posts???
All very mysterious - either no one really looks at these comments in the box under the code box or I have something uniquely totally weird going on and I am the only person in the world this is happening too??? Somehow I rather think this latter possibility is a totally implausable one??
Will do shortly, and thanks for your cotinuing help!
Since my last post I "bit the bullet" and pulled the ATMEGA 328P-PU chip from my legit UNO and placed it in the clone - guess what - the blink code loded and ran as it should, on the clone UNO!!!
Then I placed the "defective" chip in the ligit UNO and - surprise, surprise (or Not) it DIDN'T run!
Conclusion is that this clone chip is therefore UTS! I don't know if the clone has short protection as the ligit UNOs do but from this it would appear not?
So the fix now is to purchase a new 328P-PU chip which is 2/3 rds the cost of replacing the whole clone UNO! Savings $5 bucks is one thing but more importantly - not having to wait for 6 - 10 weeks for a new clone to arrive is of far greater value to me, particularly as I really do like the added dual headers and twin push button switches that are standard on this clone.
I have also noticed a number of other 328 chips having different alpha characters after the 328 and would like to know if any of these will substutute for my original 328P-PU chip assuming the same frequency; in particular I can get 328P locally off the shelf but not 328P-PU?? Any comments on doing this, please?
I have read about "software fuses(??)" and reprogramming them(??) in legit UNOs but know nothing about these or doing so - does the use of the term "fuse" here carry the same meaning as does a conventional electrical hardware fuse or is this something that is totally unrelated?
If they carry the same or similar "fuse" functionality how would I go about reprograming same??
vgtlcs:
I have also noticed a number of other 328 chips having different alpha characters after the 328 and would like to know if any of these will substutute for my original 328P-PU chip assuming the same frequency; in particular I can get 328P locally off the shelf but not 328P-PU?? Any comments on doing this, please?
The -PU (after the hyphen) refers to the packaging (DIP). Any DIP 328P will be a 328P-PU.
The P- (before the hyphen) refers to PicoPower (ability to operate at low voltage while battery powered). The issue with using a non P- part will be dealing with a different part signature while writing the bootloader.