I have a mega that fails to show on the IDE, the tools/port stays gray even though I get a beep from the computer when I plug it in.
I wonder if loading the bootloader might work.
shows how to load an uno using a mega as 'board with sketch'
Do you think it would be possible to do it the other way round if I swapped the reset/pin 10 link around?
Hi @matelot.
It won't. Burning the bootloader cannot solve the "no port for board" problem for a Mega 2560 board. You will only waste your time by trying this.
The reason is that the port is produced by a dedicated USB to serial bridge chip, completely separate from the primary ATmega2560 microcontroller that would be affected by burning the bootloader.
Please add a forum reply here to tell us which operating system you are using (e.g., "Windows")?
I ask for this information so that we can give you the appropriate instructions for your operating system.
It is an interesting project and might be useful for some niche cases. However, in general you should simply use the "Burn Bootloader" functionality of Arduino IDE when you want to burn a bootloader.
You can do that using a DIY programmer made from an Arduino board by following this tutorial:
https://docs.arduino.cc/built-in-examples/arduino-isp/ArduinoISP/
Some connection problems can be solved by restarting everything.
I run some PCs for a very long time, weeks to months, then one day, the serial monitor might stop running, or there will be some other issue with the PC and connections.
My non-technical way of looking at it is that something is saying "give me a break"
If you are restarting everything every day, then it might point to something else.
In Windows, having a look at Device Manager, finding the Ports or USB bits and doing some plugging and unplugging can give you some clues.
Are you using a powered hub, or one of the computer ports directly?
Try a different USB cable first.
If after restarting everything as tigger suggests, it is still giving you a problem, next step would be to verify your board has the ATmega16u2 chip as the USB to serial adapter, and not some other chip like some knock off boards have.
If you were needing to re-bootload it would be that chip, not the ATmega2560. Then on Mr. Gammon's page it talks about putting the ATmega16u2 into DFU mode and re-loading the USB to serial bridge software back onto it.
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