ESP8266 Community Forum

- Wed Jan 06, 2016 8:10 pm #38098 hi all,, this is my 1st post, i did not know exactly where to post so i thought this is the best logical place to start.
anyway i bought a a clock kit and it is supposed to get it's time update from the Wifi.
here is the link to the kit https://www.tindie.com/products/florinc/wifichron/
i got the kit built just fine and it is working for the most part, but i can't get the wifi to work. ( ESP8266 )
i have the ESP8266 connected and communicating with the FTDI232RL and i used a program to flash the ESP8266
and the flasher claimed it was a success, but when i try to communicate with it a terminal program all i get is.....
( Fatal exception (0): epc1=0x4021058c, epc2=0x00000000, epc3=0x00000000, excvaddr=0x00000000, depc=0x00000000 )
i am wondering if i flashed and did not get the right BIN files into it... i used ESPFLASHER from VOW STAR.com
or it could be that it installed the wrong BIN files for what i really need.. if i understand right i think i need something that can do AT commands. XTCOM ? but i think it installed NodeMCU is there a difference ?
if anyone can help me i'd really appreciate it,,,
thanks..

- Wed Jan 06, 2016 10:50 pm #38104 DF,

Give us some more details -- what BIN file did you get? Where did it come from? Which ESP do you have?
If you flashed NodeMCU, then you are out of the "AT" command world and into the world of lua and C code.
Your terminal connection is probably fine since you are getting error codes.
What instructions are you working from? It's my impression that most people doing arduino projects are just using the AT code firmware that was on the ESP when you got it. What instructions lead you to flash new firmware?

Good luck anyway.

[quote="...
i am wondering if i flashed and did not get the right BIN files into it... i used ESPFLASHER from VOW STAR.com
or it could be that it installed the wrong BIN files for what i really need.. if i understand right i think i need something that can do AT commands. XTCOM ? but i think it installed NodeMCU is there a difference ?
if anyone can help me i'd really appreciate it,,,
thanks..[/quote]

- Thu Jan 07, 2016 12:48 pm #38154 Give us some more details ok, i'll try my best here..
i am not using any arduino, but below is more info that might give you clues..

this is the module i have.. it shows as a Model: ESP8266 ESP-01
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ESP8266-Serial-WIFI-Wireless-Transceiver-Module-Send-Receive-LWIP-AP-STA-A-/221983569546?hash=item33af40768a:g:g4YAAOSwGotWh07C

and the FTDI programmer
http://www.ebay.com/itm/401042374572?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

and this is the page i was trying to learn from when i could not understand the one from the wifichron page.
http://benlo.com/esp8266/esp8266QuickStart.html

this is the clock ---> https://www.tindie.com/products/florinc/wifichron/

but the issue is to program the wifi module..this needs to be programmed so that it can
update / talk to the clock.
the clock itself works ok, just not the wifi module.
the guy explains this on his site, but it is not for me to understand.. i do not know 1/2 of what
i am reading.
his link is here.... http://timewitharduino.blogspot.com/2015/03/wifichron-with-software-support-for.html
i hope this helps you understand what i am trying to do..

- Fri Jan 08, 2016 2:49 pm #38224 I think I know what you are trying to do, but none of those links lead me directly to a bin file.

The tindle site says, "The processor, which comes programmed with a similar sketch as my other HDSP clock (check my store), is ATmega328 running at 8MHz (internal clock). It can be reprogrammed with your own sketch, using the Arduino IDE.".
That means that the clock is an Arduino based clock.

So the expectation is that you will have the "AT" firmware on your esp8266. It is not possible for me to tell by what you have said so far what firmware you have put on the esp8266 chip, so we should start there.

I'm guessing that you got esp_iot_sdk_v0.9.6_b1_15_02_15.zip.
In the bin directory of the files in that zip are the firmware.

You will need to burn 4 different things. These are the files:
boot_v1.3(b3).bin 0x00000
user1.512.new.bin 0x01000
blank.bin 0x3e000
blank.bin 0x7e000

Each of those files should be flashed to the chip at the location referred to.
[edit...]
Okay I figured I'd better actually do this before giving advice on the internet. I use linux, so my flashing tool of choice is esptool.py. Here's what I did:

gsker@veeta:/tmp/esp_iot_sdk_v0.9.6_b1/bin> esptool.py -b 345600 write_flash 0x00000 boot_v1.3\(b3\).bin 0x01000 at/user1.512.new.bin 0x3e000 blank.bin 0x7e000 blank.bin
Connecting...
Erasing flash...
Writing at 0x00000800... (100 %)
Erasing flash...
Writing at 0x00034400... (100 %)
Erasing flash...
Writing at 0x0003ec00... (100 %)
Erasing flash...
Writing at 0x0007ec00... (100 %)

Leaving...

Then I pressed the reset button on my ESP (I'm not using an ESP01 -- I have an ESP12 on a dev board with a couple of buttons) to put it back in running mode rather than flash mode.

I set my terminal program to 115,200 bps and connected.
I see this on the screen. (the messy stuff is at some other speed so it's not readable.)

��Ē�<��r���l``�(�SQS�(RQ�)HT�)SHHHC���r
ready

So I typed this (followed by carriage return and linefeed):
AT+GMR

And got this
AT version:0.22.b1.0
SDK version:0.9.6(b1)

OK

So cool. That does work.
Let me know how it goes for you. The clock looks cool.