Blown bootloader?

[mschober]

I was reloading my test RBBB the other day and moved the mouse using my touchpad, and accidentally hit the serial monitor button on the IDE while it was in the middle of the compile and upload. The RBBB is now apparently a brick. Did that possibly blow away or corrupt the bootloader? How might I recover from this?

Thanks,
Milton

[paul]

Milton,

I'd check all the hardware really well before you blame the software. But if hardware checks out then you may have a corrupt bootloader. There's a fuse set to prevent programming in the bootloader section - so this isn't supposed to happen. But it still does sometimes.

If you want to send the chip back we'll flash it and send it back to you - or you could buy one of the low-cost ISP's such as Lady Ada's ISP. Or there are a number of different ways to do it yourself - such as the Arduino to Arduino approach that just requires downloading a sketch to one Arduino (read RBBB) then running four wires to the other one. It's a bit of fuss but think of it as an adventure. See the Arduino playground for the technique or just google it.

We also sell new chips with bootloaders - so maybe send it back and order a new one and then you'll have an extra.

If you you send it back be sure to put Repair and Replace - somewhere in the address - the address is on the website.

Paul

[mschober]

Thanks, I'll try that.