ESP8266 and CH340 driver. Twist on old problem

Development Tools IDE 2.x
1

I’m getting a previously seen error when trying to upload to a Wemos D1 Mini as follows:
”Cannot configure port, something went wrong. Original message: PermissionError(13, 'A device attached to the system is not functioning.', None, 31)”

There was an excellent solution from ptillisch in Dec 2024 on what to do if the roll back driver button is greyed out but I have hit the problem where it is telling me the best driver is already installed. ptillisch if you read this - or anyone else knows how to get round the problem - I’d really appreciate the help! Thanks.

2

Hi @lukesavage.

I have found that when the driver installation gets into this state, it can be solved by uninstalling and then reinstalling the drivers. After that, the "roll back" option should be enabled.

I'll provide instructions you can follow to do that:

  1. Close Arduino IDE if it is running.
  2. Connect the Arduino board to your computer with a USB cable.
  3. Open the Windows Device Manager.
  4. Select View > Devices by type from the Device Manager menus.
  5. Open the "View" menu.
  6. If there is a ✓ to the left of the "Show hidden devices" menu item, click on "Show hidden devices" to disable it.
  7. Open the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section of the Device Manager tree.
  8. You should see a port identified as "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" under the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section (where "COMn" is some serial port e.g., COM4). Double click on that item.
    The "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog will open.
  9. Select the "Driver" tab of the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.
  10. Click the "Uninstall Device" button.
    The "Uninstall Device" dialog will open.
  11. Check the box next to "☐ Attempt to remove the driver for this device.".
  12. Click the "Uninstall" button.
    The "Uninstall Device" and "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialogs will close.
  13. Disconnect the USB cable of the Arduino board from your computer.
  14. Reconnect the USB cable of the Arduino board to your computer.
  15. Wait for the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" device to appear under the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section of the Device Manager tree.
    :red_exclamation_mark: This will take a couple of minutes as Windows must first automatically reinstall the driver.
    :red_exclamation_mark: It might appear first as a "USB2.0-Serial" device under the "Other devices section of the tree. Just wait for a little longer and it will appear in its final place under the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section.
  16. Click the following link to download the previous version of the driver from an archive of the chip manufacturer's website:
    https://web.archive.org/web/20220519153932/https://www.wch-ic.com/downloads/file/65.html
  17. Wait for the download to finish.
  18. Run the downloaded CH341SER.EXE file.
  19. A "User Account Control" dialog may now appear asking "Do you want to allow this app to make changes to your device?". Click the "Yes" button.
  20. A "DriverSetup(X64)" dialog will open. Click the "INSTALL" button in the dialog.
  21. Wait for the driver installation to finish, as indicated by the appearance of a "Driver install success!" dialog.
  22. Click the "OK" button in the "Driver install success!" dialog.
    The dialog will close.
  23. Click the X icon at the top right of the "DriverSetup(X64)" dialog.
    The dialog will close.
  24. Switch back to the Windows "Device Manager".
  25. Double click on the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" device under the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section.
    The "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog will open.
  26. Select the "Driver" tab of the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.
  27. Click the "Update driver" button.
    An "Update Drivers Device - USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" dialog will open.
  28. Click on "Search automatically for drivers" in the "Update Drivers Device - USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" dialog.
  29. You should now see the driver installation wizard update the driver. Wait for the update to finish, as indicated by the message "Windows has successfully updated your drivers" in the dialog.
  30. Click the "Close" button in the "Update Drivers Device - USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" dialog.
    The dialog will close.
  31. Click the "Roll Back Driver" button in the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.
    The "Driver Package rollback" dialog will open.
  32. Click the radio button next to "My apps don't work with this driver" in the "Driver Package rollback" dialog .
  33. Click the "Yes" button.
    The "Driver Package rollback" dialog will close.
  34. Click the "Close" button in the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.

Now start Arduino IDE again and repeat whatever you were doing before when you encountered that error before. Hopefully this time everything will work as expected.

3

Thanks for such an unbelievably quick reply - but going through your steps I seem to end up in the same place. I uninstalled the device, plugged the board back into the com port, it recognised and initialised the device and the roll back driver button is still greyed out and the automatic search for drivers is telling me i have the best driver. Is there a way I can manually point it to the old version that I have downloaded?

4

I'm going to ask you to provide some additional information that might help us to understand how to proceed.

:red_exclamation_mark: This procedure is not intended to solve the problem. The purpose is to gather more information.

Please do this:

  1. Connect the Arduino board to your computer with a USB cable.
  2. Open the Windows Device Manager.
  3. Select View > Devices by type from the Device Manager menus.
  4. Open the "View" menu.
  5. If there is a ✓ to the left of the "Show hidden devices" menu item, click on "Show hidden devices" to disable it.
  6. Open the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section of the Device Manager tree.
  7. You should see a port identified as "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn)" under the "Ports (COM & LPT)" section (where "COMn" is some serial port e.g., COM4). Double click on that item.
    The "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog will open.
  8. Select the "Drivers" tab of the "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.

Now please reply here on this forum topic to tell us the version number you saw after "Driver Version" field in that "USB-SERIAL CH340 (COMn) Properties" dialog.

5

Version 3.9.2024.9 with a dat of 16/09/2024

6

Did you perform all 34 steps?

7

No! When I got to step 29 I didn’t get the result - I got the same “already have the best driver response” and the roll back button remained greyed out. So I couldn’t follow all 34 steps. :thinking:

8

Sorry to hear that. That is the reason I switched to Apple, no device manager to mess me up.

9

Have managed to get it working by disconnecting from the internet, uninstalling, finding the CH341 files (which haven’t been deleted despite ticking the box) and then installing using the old driver given in the instructions above. Turned off automatic device driver updates and reconnected to the internet. It works - but now I need to install gpedit.msc so that I can just exclude that one driver rather than all. But now the gpedit won’t install!

10

Hello,

I have two solutions for you.

1/ Try new package 3.1.3:

https://bacciel.com/tools/package_champollion_esp8266_index.json

2/ In a command prompt (cmd), use the command : serialinit.dll COM3 115200

(COM3 is an example; replace it with the correct port) before to use Arduino IDE, or just before upload the program to the ESP8266 :

I’am using seconde solution for now, and work it fine.

See you soon. Good luck

Cyril