I am running into issues getting my various hardware and computers to talk. I had some ch340 nano clones that I tried to get running and had issues on two of my computers, a Mac Mini M4 running 2.x, and a windows 11 machine also running 2, but was able to get the ch340 clones to work on a 15 year old imac running High Sierra and version 1.6 of the IDE. After trying the newest IDE version on that old imac that would work (I tried 1.8 to see if I could get FastLED library to work) I couldn't get anything to work from nano clones to RBBB boards with FTDI dongle (old school) but could get an UNO to load programs. One evening I was able to get the RBBBs to work on the new Apple silicon M4 mini on the 2.x IDE. The next day I tried the legacy IDE on that machine to see if I could get the Nano clones to work and in messing with that and the ch340 driver install on that machine I can no longer get the RBBB board and FTDI dongle to work, but can get the old real UNO to work.
So between the two macs, new and old, plus the windows 11 machine I have only been able to get the ch340 nano clone to work on the old machine for a short time but now they don't work with any computer. The boards show up on system registers and in the IDE, but I get various errors when trying to upload depending on which computer I am working with.
I think the ch340 driver is messing with my ability to use the FTDI dongle on the M4 Mac Mini. I think its install also killed my ability to use the FTDI on the old mac as that was the only change made at the time. The windows machine already had attempts at getting the nano to work before I tried the RBBB and FTDI combo there so it has never worked. The UNO works on the windows machine.
I know I have made a complete mess of things and if you made it this far reading through my shenanigans then I thank you for listening. Any help from the masses would be greatly appreciated. Attempts at updating the FTDI driver have not helped nor have attempts at removing the ch340 driver using terminal. I am in the process of decommissioning the old imac so I am looking at solutions with the new hardware but will gladly try things on the old stuff too.
Thanks again!
RBBB? Had to look that one up. Really BareBones Board by any chance? That would explain the use of those FT232RL modules to communicate with whatever is being used on the boards.
If the CH340 driver is causing problems with communicating with the FTDI board (all things being equal it shouldn't) then one way to test this would be to remove the CH340 driver, in which case operation of the FTDI board should return to normal.
I beleive on a Mac its a matter of removing driver files which can be done from the Terminal. You would need to navigate to the /Library/Extensions/ directory and then identify and remove the relevant .kext file (usually usbserial.kext). You can move it elsewhere if you want to keep a copy of it, or just remove it with sudo rm -R command. You should also remove any associated files in the /private/var/db/receipts/ directory. After that, restart and see what happens when trying to use the FTDI module.
Its interesting you got an "old real UNO" to work as this use an entirely different driver.
If the board has a ch340 chip, why are you messing with an FTDI? I can't follow the rest of it; you are one of those people who defy any hope to help. Good luck.
Thanks BitSeeker. Yes, I meant the Really Bare Bones Board, sorry for the confusion with the acronym; I also forgot just how comically ancient they are, lol. I pulled those old soldiers out last night as a hail mary to see if I could get anything to work at all and low and behold they worked on the new M4 apple but stopped working once I started playing around with the legacy version of the IDE in an attempt to get the nano clones working. That is when I started to mess around with the drivers.
On new Apple Silicon like the M4 the drivers are run out of piece of software that stays in the applications folder, they don't show up via a terminal search of library/extensions. I did find a couple of files in the receipts directory that were ch340 related and removed those via terminal. After restart they are no longer there, but still no luck getting the FTDI dongle and RBBB to load stuff. The old, real UNO remains functioning with this machine. I will keep plugging away at it but at least with getting the UNO running I can work on this project some. Getting the ch340 nano clones working would be boss but not sure the juice is worth the squeeze after these last couple of days.
Thanks again!
It's a mess, Sonofcy, I know. I am messing with FTDI because I could only get the ch340 clones to work for a short while on old software. When I updated that software to get a certain library to work it all went south on me.
The FTDI dongle and the really bare bones board was just a shot in the dark to get something working and it did work, until I kept trying to get the ch340 nano clones to work and then I lost the use of the FTDI and RBBB.
I know it is a total nightmare to follow. I am sorry. I might write off the stuff I can't get working and focus on the little that does work. It's just frustrating losing something I had working and not knowing how to get back to that point.