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Periodic Error: Hardware communnication failure! — Parallax Forums

Periodic Error: Hardware communnication failure!

Jim McCorisonJim McCorison Posts: 359
edited 2004-12-30 18:52 in BASIC Stamp
I have a BS2 with a USB BOE Rev B. It has been working fine for the past week, but today has started giving me sporadic errors while trying to download programs to it. The error I get is:

Hardware communication failure! Check serial cable and power supply.

Immediately downloading again works fine.

I don't know if this is related or not, but this is also the longest program I've written for it, although the failure occurs at different points in the download and occasionally quite early.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

Thanks,
Jim

Comments

  • steve_bsteve_b Posts: 1,563
    edited 2004-12-30 12:56
    What's your power source?· Battery/Wal-wart?

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    ·

    Steve
    http://members.rogers.com/steve.brady
    http://www.geocities.com/paulsopenstage

    "Inside each and every one of us is our one, true authentic swing. Something we was born with. Something that's ours and ours alone. Something that can't be learned... something that's got to be remembered."
  • Jim McCorisonJim McCorison Posts: 359
    edited 2004-12-30 15:58
    Sorry, that could be an issue. I'm using a battery. But the strange thing is that the errors happen more commonly just after turning on the BOE. I turn it off between tests if I'm making more than minor changes. The error will happen more frequently during the first download or two after turning it one, and almost never happens if I've had the BOE running for a while. Exactly the opposite of what I would expect from a low battery.

    Jim
  • steve_bsteve_b Posts: 1,563
    edited 2004-12-30 16:30
    That is weird....

    Just for the heck of it, if you have a spare battery (don't use the one in the smoke detector nono.gif ) then give it a try and see if it makes a difference.



    I will never use a battery when programming....just an old habit from working in a tech shop and trying to flash bioses on a bad power day!

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    ·

    Steve
    http://members.rogers.com/steve.brady
    http://www.geocities.com/paulsopenstage

    "Inside each and every one of us is our one, true authentic swing. Something we was born with. Something that's ours and ours alone. Something that can't be learned... something that's got to be remembered."
  • dandreaedandreae Posts: 1,375
    edited 2004-12-30 18:32
    If you are using Windows XP I·think that you may need to change the latency setting in your com port.· The easiest way to do this is to:

    Click on "Control Panel"

    Click·on "Systems"

    Click on "Hardware"

    Click on "Device Manager"

    Click on "Ports"

    Click on the com port that you are using

    Click on "Port Setting"

    Click on "Advance" and change the "Latency" from 16 to 1 and this should solve the problem.



    Dave

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    Dave Andreae

    Tech Support
    dandreae@parallax.com
    www.parallax.com

    ·
  • Jim McCorisonJim McCorison Posts: 359
    edited 2004-12-30 18:52
    Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner!

    Dave gets a new kwepie doll... smurf.gif

    Ok, it's a Surf, but it's the closest one there.


    Dave, Thanks for the help. Before the change I could download 3 or 4 times without the error. Afterwards, well, let's say I got tired of counting around 25.

    Cheers,
    Jim
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