ESP8266 Community Forum

Hi - I have a couple of ESP-05s that I'm messing around with, and I heard that if you have later versions, it is possible to reflash them, using AT commands. Somehow. Is this true?

I wonder if the ones I have are "latest versions" or not

This is what I get when I connect...



...and this is what I get on AT+RST



All ideas, suggestions, links appreciated!

As far as I know, that's​ not possible. In order to flash an ESP you will need an USB to Serial converter, or something like that.
Apart from that, if your program uses the OTA API, you can perform OTA updates to your program, but first, it's necessary to load those codes to the ESP.
See if this helps: https://www.google.es/url?q=http://esp8266.github.io/Arduino/versions/2.0.0/doc/ota_updates/ota_updates.html&sa=U&ved=0ahUKEwj0_Lm7pZLTAhXKVRoKHUkzCsMQFggLMAA&usg=AFQjCNHYB1QYmzgxbUwsB0lSKosHl3BdRA

I see. That's very helpful.
I wonder if this rumour came about because the latest espressif firmware might already incorporta ethe OTA update system. I'll look into it when I have some more time, it's not critical or anything, I was just curious.

Thanks for the link.

I was able to reflash one once, but I bricked another in the process. It's not easy. Basically you have to build a rig with wire whiskers to directly access the chip pins responsible for the reset mode. (I bricked one trying to hold wires on the pins manually)

You basically hotwire the chip to program it like any other ESP with the full program/reset pins