- Tue Oct 11, 2016 6:47 am
#56359
I originated this topic, so I'm not the best person to be offering advice about the subject, but I'll list in laymans terms what I've since found has worked for me in case it may work for others who are still having Format difficulties.
If I use the analogy of formatting a disk, Version 2 did a full Format by sequencing through and resetting all addresses, whereas Version 3 just does a 'Quick' Format by resetting the directory file allocation table pointers without actually resetting their destination contents. So where a V2 Format took over half a minute of flickering blue led to complete, a V3 Format completes in a couple of seconds with a single wink.
Up until Sept 9th and somewhere around V3 Alpha 43, the flasher Format just ran and did the format.
Since about Sept 12th, and around V3 Alpha 45 - when support for different size modules was added - the flasher Format now must first
extract files and sub-folder contents for the different sized modules.
So after running these later ESP_Basic_Flasher.exe Formats
you should find a couple of new files added called 'esptool.exe' and 'version.h', plus a new 'Build' subfolder containing '1M', '2M', '4M' and '512K' subfolders, each containing an appropriate version of 'ESP8266Basic.cpp.bin'
It was stated that the 512K version was stripped down to make it fit, and that the 1M, 2M and 4M were all full versions - but I have some doubts about the 1M being full because it is actually only the same file size as the 512K version, whereas the 2M and 4M are both larger files. That suggests that the 1M version would be more likely to have the reduced facilities of the same-sized 512K version rather than the larger 2M and 4M full versions... but that's only my logical assumption, which may be wrong.
What is important to note is that the new different Flasher Format behaviour of extracting and writing files to disk
can be automatically blocked or sand-boxed by anti-virus protection software, in which case the files and sub-folders will
not be created, and the Format program will obviously fail with some error msg. What's more, you could 'OK' your current version so that it is accepted and works, but each new downloaded version could be seen as a different new program and blocked again.
Not only that, but
Windows itself may not allow creation of the files and folders unless run in Administrator mode.
So I suggest that the new flasher Format warrents a slight change of life-style... always run it as Administrator, and always run it in an empty sub-folder so you can check that the above-mentioned files and folders are extracted and written to disk ok.
In addition, I would suggest first starting the flasher (
as administrator don't forget) so that it can sniff out and report on the Com port in use, and
then to reboot your ESP device into flash mode and do the Format, otherwise the port-sniffing may cause the device to become unresponsive for writing to.
You should see a brief single blink of the blue led, then an 'OK' window pop up after a second or two.
If you still get a Format error, you can do the Format from the browser SETTINGS page after connecting by wifi, but that may not be completely straightforward either.
Close down the failed flasher, wait a few seconds for things to be tidied up, then restart the flasher with a clean slate. Reboot your ESP device back into flashing mode again, then Flash the interpreter.
Once flashing is finished and the device has rebooted into AP mode, wifi connect to the appropriate device name.
You want to load the SETTINGS page to select FORMAT, but currently with V3 A55, typing 192.168.4.1/settings into the browser may fail straight after reflashing.
In which case you can get around the problem by typing your favourite *@!?&$% swear word into the edit window then SAVEing it, then you should be able to select SETTINGS and do FORMAT. After wifi reconnection, browse to the edit page again, and check that your saved swear word has gone, then you can happily continue with a smile on your face!
