ESP8266 Community Forum

I'm the defintion of a new noob here as I picked up an ESP8255 just to have fun with this project from Instructables - https://www.instructables.com/Matrix-Co ... ide-Panel/

Ordered the circuit board from PCHUB and put it all together per instructions but when it came time to connect it via IDE I'm not given a port. The board gives a quick blue flash upon plug in so I'm getting some sort of connection but IDE doesn't recognize it. Unplugged the 8266 and plugged in a spare UNO and right away I got a USP COM4.
Thought I must jave messed up sometinh in building this little board so I grabbed another 8266 out of a new bag and just plugged it in via USB and again I get the USB beep confirmation, a blue flash on the board but IDE doesn't recognize it. I did follow all the instructions per the project

1. Add the ESP8266 extension. Click the following: File > Preferences > Additional Board Managers > And add the following message: https://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/pack ... index.json

2. Download the ESP8266. Click the following: Tools > Board > Board Manager > Find and download ESP8266

3. Select the board. Click the following: Tools > Board > NodeMCU1.0 (ESP-12E)

Select the port. Click the following: Tools > Port > COM_

But at this point there is no USB COM Port. Just the standard COM1, which doesn't connect.

I'm sure this is pure noob flustering but can someone point me in the right direction to get a connection?

Thanks

That looks like a nice project.
I think the best thing you can do is trying to get the NodeMCU (you refer to as "ESP8266") to work first.

For this you have to remove it (the NodeMCU board, not the ESP-module) from the custom PCB: I assume you have soldered the two together (as per instructions), but you'd better use a 2*15 pin socket (or two strips of 15 female pin headers) instead, so you can place and remove the NodeMCU when troubleshooting.

When you've separated (de-soldered, but be careful when doing this) the two boards, you should be able to connect the NodeMCU to your computer:

• Remove all serial devices
• Install the correct driver for your USB-UART chip on the NodeMCU: CH340 (rectangle chip) or CP210x (square chip)
• Open "Device manager" (right click on the Windows "Start" button -> "Device manager")
• Expand the "Ports (COM & LPT)" tree node and make a note of all COM-port already shown there
• Connect the NodeMCU to your computer: you should hear a "Device connected" sound
• Have a look again a the device manager: an extra COM-port should be available; make a note of the port number
• Start the Arduino IDE
• Go to "Tools" -> "Port": in the list you should also see the new COM-port, select it
• Go to "Tools" -> "Serial monitor": a new window is shown
• In the "Monitor" window, set the rate to 74880 Baud
• Now press the reset (RST) button on the NodeMCU: you should see a boot message appear in the monitor that looks like this:
  Code: Select all ets Jan  8 2013,rst cause:2, boot mode:(3,7)

load 0x4010f000, len 3584, room 16
tail 0
chksum 0xb0
csum 0xb0
v2843a5ac
~ld
• Success! You can see experiment and program your NodeMCU now

Raw ESP8266's don't have USB ports... so I'm assuming you actually have a NodeMCU, WeMos... or equivalent.
You also didn't mention, what OS you're using for development... PC, Mac, Linux. If I assume you have Windows, it often doesn't recognize a certain USB chip (CH340). The behavior you describe sounds like that is the issue. The following link jumps you to how to check if this might be the issue and how to correct it.
https://inqonthat.com/arduino-ide-configuration-for-windows/#DeviceManager

Thanks for the help here. Unfortunately it's still not giving me a COM port. I had a spare MCU (ESP8266MOD) and went through installing the device driver (CH340). What I do see when now plugging in the MCU is a CP2102 USB to UART Bridge Controller that will appear and disappear on plugging and unplugging the MCU.

A qualifier here is that I am on a Windows 11 PC so if that could be the problem I'll try again on a Win10 laptop.