Hi everyone,
I'm testing the new Leonardo board. I've read through the [http://arduino.cc/en/Guide/ArduinoLeonardo]getting started[/url] page and I think I understand the differences between this board and the older boards. My question deals with serial communication. I've developed a sketch which sends information back and forth to another application using serial commands. Basically the arduino board sets up all the pins, prints the most current sensor data (all analog pins, and 3 digital pins), and then waits for data coming over from the application at which point it parses it up and sends the data out to the remaining digital pins. Now, all of this works great with the Uno (and I also have a version for the Mega). I'm trying to modify the code so that it now works with the Leonardo... but I'm getting some strange results.
First, the Leonardo never seems to 'hold' onto a given virtual port. I know it temporarily creates them on the fly, but it seems it only does so when I hold down the reset button. After a few seconds it loses the port again. So, every time I want to upload a sketch, I have to hold down the reset button, wait for it say "Uploading" and then release the reset button. Then, it seems to upload just fine. However, I can't then launch the serial monitor right after that, because as soon as it's done uploading, it loses the connection again. If I hold reset again, I can launch the serial monitor, but nothing seems to be getting printed to the serial monitor (where as I should see a formatted string of data flying by if this had been done using the Uno). I've even tried basic example sketches like the AnalogReadSerial example, and this also never seems to work. Do I have a faulty board (I purchased it from sparkfun)? Or am I doing something wrong in my code?
Also, I've gone through and installed the driver per the website instructions... but I'm still getting a strange icon showing up next to my board in the device manager. Is this what it's supposed to look like? I've pointed the driver to the drivers folder in the 1.01 Arduino folder.