FTDI Driver problems with Windows 7 64-bit

Chris Savage

Hey everyone, if you've had any issues programming your Propeller where the IDE could not find it, this could be due to the driver not being installed for those who just installed on Windows 7 64-bit (not sure if other version are affected yet or not). If you just got started and cannot access the Propeller chip via USB please have a look at the following post.

http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?139524-FTDI-Driver-problems-with-Windows-7-64-bit-(Also-uninstalling-drivers-COM-entries)

Francis Bauer

At last weeks Parallax Expo in Rocklin, I purchased a Prop BOE. I am just now tryiing to connect to it with my HP laptop running Windows 7 professional 64-bit.

When I try connecting the USB cable, Windows 7 tries installing the device driver and eventually displays an error dialog box indicating that the driver software can't successfully install.

I found this thread in the forum and followed the above post and tried the suggested tips. I ran the CDM GUI uninstaller, rebooted and then ran the setup executable for 2.08.14. The setup installer displayed that the FTDI CDM driver install process completed in the command prompt window. I still can't get the Prop BOE USB to successfully connect and have the driver software to install sucessfully. I haven't had any problems with my Prop Quickstart board making a successful USB connection and have the Prop tool work on this same laptop.

So what is different about the Prop BOE versus the Prop Quickstart board in terms of USB connectivity? What else can I do to get this working?

I would certainly like to be able to use this $120+ Prop BOE, but for now I can't :-(

Rayman

Francis, I'll take a stab at helping... I don't have a Prop BOE, but just took a peek at it...

First, make sure you have the power switch on.
Second, tells us what error message the Prop Tool gives you. Is it "No Prop Chip found on any serial port, Scanned COM X"?
(That would mean it sees a com port, but does not regonize the Prop.)
Or, is it something like "No comm ports found". That would mean the FTDI driver isn't installed right...

I'd try a different USB port on the laptop and maybe try a different computer too, to make sure it's not a driver problem.

Third, Not sure about BOE, but many Prop boards have lights next to the FTDI chip that tell you something about the status...
Usually, leds will flash when you connect the USB cable and the FTDI chip wakes up.
LEDs should also flash when you try to program or "Identify" with the Prop tool.
A different LED should flash when the Prop talks back...

Anyway, tell us what the LEDs are doing...

prof_braino

Also, are there any other USB devices plugged in?

I had a fun time using a new-ish rig that had only USB connections; early USB devices (keyboard, mouse, hub) would not play well in certain combinations. Replacing them all with more compliant devices solved the issue.

Francis Bauer

Thank you for the suggestions/tips, here is what I found so far:

1. I tried connecting the Prop BOE to my Windows XP desktop system. The XP system detected the new USB hardware and installed the driver without any problems. I was able to connect to the Prop BOE with the Prop Tool and download programs into it. So the Prop BOE board and drivers work fine in Windows XP, which at least verifies that this Prop BOE board is healthy.

2. I tried connecting the Prop BOE to my Windows 7 professional 64-bit laptop using 3 different USB ports and still get the same error message from Windows complaining that the USB driver fails to install.

3. The 2 Rx/Tx LEDs on the Prop BOE do flash a couple of times when I first connect the board to the USB port, this occurs during the time the Windows dialog box is displaying "Installing device driver software", but they stay off after the Windows dialog box is displaying the "Device driver software was not successfully installed" message. In comparing the Rx/Tx LED activity between the working Prop Quickstart board and the Prop BOE, it does seem that there is a little more activity on the Prop Quickstart board, probably because the USB port driver is working correctly and the board is able to send and receive data.

4. When I use the "Identify Hardware" function in the Prop tool, it just comes back saying "No serial ports found", which does seem to confirm that the USB driver software isn't working for the Prop BOE. I tried connecting both the Prop Quickstart and the Prop BOE at the same time and the Prop tool still only sees the Prop Quickstart board.

5. The only other USB device connected to the laptop during these experiments is a USB Logitech marble mouse/trackball. I tried connecting the Prop BOE without the USB Logictech mouse/trackball connected only to still have the same install failure issue.

It certainly seems that there is some sort of issue with the FTDI driver associated with the Prop BOE running on Windows 7 64-bit. Since the Prop Quickstart board works fine there must be a different driver trying to be used with the Prop BOE or at least some other mode of the driver is trying to be used. The Prop tool on my laptop is installed and running as a (x86) 32 bit application, but I don't know how the USB drivers are installed as to whether they are in the 32 or 64 bit world.

If anyone has any other insight or suggestions please let me know. I would like to use my nice new powerful Win7 laptop as opposed to my older XP system when working with the Prop BOE...

Rayman

Funny your laptop works with Quickstart but not Prop BOE. I don't think I've seen that behaviour before...
Anyway, maybe what I would try is doing "Windows Update" and look in the recommended and optional stuff for a new FTDI driver.

If not, maybe try Chis Savage's advice again in the link in the top post...

jazzed

Francis Bauer wrote: »

If anyone has any other insight or suggestions please let me know. I would like to use my nice new powerful Win7 laptop as opposed to my older XP system when working with the Prop BOE...

Try different USB ports on your laptop.

I use Windows7 64 Professional and Home editions. The only times I see driver related problems are when the hardware is not working.

There are 2 ways I've had problems.

1. My C3 board seems to have poor solder connections but will work most of the time - it embarrassed me during my expo demo.
2. My Windows7 laptop has mechanically unstable USB ports on it - some work better than others.

Rayman

Actually, now that I think about it...
There is a delay setting in the Prop tool that might help you.

Try playing with Edit-->Preferences and then "Post-reset Delay (ms)" at the bottom.

I've heard somebody say that playing with this made a board work...

rwgast_logicdesign

I remmber this thing from elementary school, it was a little shell with wheels and pens or something. Basically we would program it and it would drive on a piece of paper and draw spiral graphsthis was turtle rifght?

Francis Bauer

I don't believe the problem is related to a specific USB port, since they all have the same problem. In doing my experiments I used the same USB cable that I used when connecting to the Prop Quickstart board and I only changed the connection at the board end, so this should elminate any physical issue with the cable connection at the USB port end on the computer.

I've tried using the USB driver CDM un-installer that Chris Savage referred to in his original post to remove the FTDI USB drivers to see if re-installing them in various ways would cure the issue. What I found was that when I connected the Prop Quickstart board, Windows 7 would always automatically load and use a new copy of the FTDI USB driver software (FT232R) using the normal Microsoft update/install process regardless of whether or not I manually installed the FTDI USB driver software as referenced in Chris Savage's post. So it would seem that the Windows 7 driver install process is always loads a version from its own repository when it needs one for the FTDI USB.

I'm still trying to determine what Windows 7 is trying to load/use when I connect the Prop BOE board. Since the installation always fails I haven't been able to get a good look at what driver set it is trying to load and/or use. The install process fails pretty quickly with the Prop BOE board so I don't think it is trying to actually load a different driver set from the repository, even after removing the FTDI CDM drivers. It almost seems that the install failure is due to some failure with the USB driver detection process.

In looking at the two boards (Prop Qickstart & Prop BOE), I see that the Quickstart board uses a FT232RL FTDI chip and the Prop BOE board uses FT232RQ FTDI chip. I'm not sure what differences exist between the two chips, but apparently there is something different.

I'll keep plugging away at this issue, but I suspect it is going to take someone in Parallax familiar with the FTDI setup on the Prop BOE and/or someone with www.ftdichip.com to resolve the issue.

Unsoundcode

FTDI have an application note for troubleshooting driver installation on Win 7 64, AN_119. FTDI also have on their site a utility called USBView which allows you to view the information of all connected USB devices.

They list the possibility of the wrong driver being installed, although the 232 will be visible in Device Manager it will have the yellow triangle denoting the wrong driver for that particular device and then details how to update the driver. So it is possible to have two FT232 devices and have one with the wrong driver installed.

If your Quickstart works yet the BOE does not I would be inclined to say the CDM package installed correctly and that the problem is that the BOE needs its driver updating in Device Manager. The app note lists one or two other possible causes and remedies you could try.

Here is the link http://www.ftdichip.com/Support/Documents/AppNotes/AN_119_FTDI_Drivers_Installation_Guide_for_Windows7.pdf

Jeff T.

Francis Bauer

Problem SOLVED!!! My PropBOE software driver connection issue was a USB 3.0 vs USB 2.0 port issue.

Thank you, Unsoundcode, for the tip about the USBview utility. It was a big help in determining what was causing my Prop BOE connection issue.

Even though I thought I previously tried all the various USB ports on my laptop, in turns out that there is a major difference between the USB ports on the left side of my laptop versus the right side. The USBview utility helped show me what that difference was. Anyway in turns out the PropBOE can only successfully connect to the USB ports on the right side of the laptop since they are USB 2.0 ports. The USB ports on the left side are USB 3.0 ports. For some reason at least on my laptop the PropBOE won't work with the USB 3.0 ports, while the Prop Quickstart will.

I've attached two images showing the output of the USBview utility. One shows the details of the PropBOE, the other the Prop Quickstart when they are both connected to USB 2.0 (Intel) ports. The PropBOE wouldn't connect successfully when using the Renesas USB 3.0 Host controller, while the Prop Quickstart could.

So anyway, thanks again to everyone who have offerred advice/tips, I'm good to go now...

Unsoundcode

Thats good to hear and will be useful for others to know.

It was interesting to see listed in the device info "Parallax" and PropBOE" I have never noticed that before and I wonder if this is something they have just started to do.

Jeff T.

WBA Consulting

I second the "SOLVED" status!

I have the same issue with my brand new HP Elitebook 8560p that is running Windows 7 Enterprise 64 bit. I also have two different sets of USB ports on my laptop. The ones on the right are USB 3.0 and give the same error when I plug in the PropBOE. The ports on the left side are USB 2.0 and after plugging the PropBOE into those, it works as expected. As a further note, I did not update any FTDI drivers manually, but when I plugged in my Quickstart into the USB 3.0 ports while trying to figure out the problem, Windows automatically grabbed an update from the net and the Quickstart has worked from first plug-in. I can now program my PropBOE from my new laptop. It works just fine through the USB ports on my docking station as well which are also USB 2.0.

Thanks to all!

Chris Savage

I'm glad you were able to figure this out. This new information is important and I have forwarded it to our Engineering and Tech Support Groups so they are aware of the USB 3.0 issue.

WBA Consulting

Another similar tidbit regarding USB 2.0 vs 3.0. The tiny receiver for my "Microsoft Wireless Mobile Mouse 4000" works in the USB 3.0 ports, but when plugged into a USB 2.0 port, I get the same device driver install error as the PropBOE did on the USB 3.0 ports. Had to laugh, but I also knew to immediately try the ports on the opposite side.

I guess the final answer is: "If your laptop cannot see the PropBOE, try the USB ports on the other side"

Invent-O-Doc

I'm having the same problems. A win7 64b system on a laptop that has USB 3.0 ports only. Prop Demo Board works but Board of Education does not function at all. How frustrating! Any word o a resolution?

WBA Consulting

This may sound dumb, but have you tried a USB 2.0 Hub in one of the USB 3.0 ports?

Rayman

Hey WBA, I just had that same idea!

I think it should work...

Leon

It looks like FTDI has a new driver which includes USB 3.0.