ESP8266 Community Forum

Hi - I have the Arduino IDE running and have been successfully loading and modifying programs on a Huzzah ESP-8266 board.

I have recently bought a 2-pack of Makerfocus ESP8266 boards on Amazon. This is the link: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01IK9GEQG/ref=od_aui_detailpages00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I have tried connecting the board to the computer using both the USB to Micro-USB cable into the receptacle on the board and an FTDI cable connected to the Vcc, Gnd, TX and RX pins. The results are the same:
- I get the error:
warning: espcomm_sync failed
error: espcomm_open failed
error: espcomm_upload_mem failed
error: espcomm_upload_mem failed
- The Arduino IDE correctly identifies the COM port the board is connected to (COM5)
- I have tried various speeds down to 9600Bd
- No lights show on the board
- The chip has ESP-12N on it. See photo below.

Questions: I suspect that the device is pre-loaded with a LUA interpreter. How do I re-flash it to work with the Arduino IDE? What board do I select in the Arduino board manager? What other troubleshooting actions can I take to load a program?

At the moment I am just trying to run one of the example programs.

Thanks,

Paul

There is nothing special about flashing on top of the LUA; it is just another bit of firmware like an Arduino sketch.

Are you putting it into flash mode by holding the flash button down and pressing reset before initioating the upload from IDE?

You should see the LED on the ESP module briefly flash when you do the rest.

Hi - this module is acting differently to the Huzzah module I have previously used. On the Huzzah module the red and blue LEDs flash briefly when applying power and when the Reset button is pushed. When the GPIO-0 button is pushed the red light comes on and when the reset button is pushed, the red LED lights dimly indicating that the board is in loader mode and ready to receive data.

On the NodeIO board, the LEDs do not do anything when applying power. The buttons are marked 'FLASH' and 'RST' and do not cause the LEDs to illuminate.

Also I do not know where to get the Arduino code to re-flash it, or how to load that code.

Paul

There is no separate Arduino code to load. You just upload the compiled sketch from the Arduino IDE. It is a completely self contained piece of firmware. Normally you would just hold down the flash button, press and release reset, then release flash, and do an upload from the Arduino IDE.

Slightly worrying that you don't see any LED activity when powering up or pressing buttons. I would use the terminal facility in Arduino IDE (Tools) to see if there is anything being transmitted on the serial when reset is pressed and released.