Pickit 3 fails to program WiFire

[resodad]

Hello,

I am not able to program Wifire using PikKit3.

This was working fine earlier and I don't know what is different now.

MPLAB recognizes the PicKit 3.

MPLAB gets as far as detecting target voltage but then "unable to connect to target device"

ALSO, plugging the Pickit 3 into the ICSP header makes the flashing user LED turn off as if something is shorted.

Thanks,

John

[JColvin]

Hi @resodad,

What revision of the Wi-FIRE are you using so I can confirm which JP number you are using? I don't have a PicKIT3 to test this specifically (I only have a chipKIT PGM), but could you attach a picture of how you have the PicKIT3 attached? One reason I can think of to make the user LED stop flashing would be that the pin 1's are not lined up as that would cause the clock pin (PGC) to be held high and the data pin (PGD) to be held low, as well as swapping other pins, which I imagine could cause the microcontroller to get tied up.

Thanks,
JColvin

[resodad]

This has happened on both WiFire Rev C and Rev D.

You can see in the photo the white arrow in the Pickit3 is lined up with pin 1 of the ICSP header.

In the picture the six pins are just stuck on the holes, but the symptom occurred with a soldered header too.

The same thing happened with Microchip's ICD3 instead or Pickit3.

This is still a problem, but not urgent; it IS programming now, although I didn't do anything notable to fix it.

I AM worried that it's going to happen again.

John

 

 

[JColvin]

Hi @resodad,

I'm not certain what the reasoning behind making the flashing LEDs suddenly turn off. I do know that the default configuration of the Wi-FIRE only has LED 1 (LD1 as per the silkscreen) flash during the initial booting sequence (presuming it has the chipKIT/Arduino bootloader on it), but then does not light up any other LEDs (and it does not have a "power good" LED).

What power supply do you have attached to your WiFIRE and how do you have voltage regulation jumpers configured?

Thanks,
JColvin

[resodad]

This is not a new board; it happens on boards I have already been using with no prior issues.

I had the LEDs programmed to flash.

I have tried different power supplies: Bench supply, 3S LiPo, 120VAC plug-in adapter, but always plugged into the WiFire barrel jack, and the VU jumper is set accordingly to EXT.

VU is usually 12 to 15 V.

Jumpers are set for the on-board regulator to be ON.( LDO IN to VU, and LDO Out to 5V0)

The header power jumperJP9  is set to5V0.

John

 

 

 

[JColvin]

Hi @resodad,

I'm not certain what the issue is. I was able to locate a PICkit3 in the office and confirmed that if there is a program running on the Wi-FIRE and then the PICkit3 is connect to it (in this case, connect by clicking the connect button on the MPLAB Integrated Programming Environment, rather than MPLAB X), the program will be lost, but was not able to reproduce the "unable to connect to target device error" (unless I did not have it powered). The only other thing I could think of is if the settings were such that the Wi-FIRE was trying to also be powered through the PICkit3 which could potentially cause a voltage conflict, though I believe those settings are off by default, but I'm not certain on that.

Thanks,
JColvin