Contents
Summary
I document here my experience with using the ABRISP mkII programmer on my Mac OS X Intel computer.
Tools
You will need the following tools:
- binutils
- gcc
- avr-libc
- uisp
- libusb
- avrdude
Installation
Warning: These notes were taken from my own experience. They might not apply to you.
Install binutils, gcc, avr-libc and uisp using Fink
fink install binutils gcc avr-libc uisp
Should do the job.
Install libusb and avrdude
At first I tried a precompiled package of all of these tools known as AvrMacPack. You will also find OSX-AVR which is an alternative. But none of these packages did it for me.
First problem: USB device not found
First time I ran avrdude I had the following issue:
avrdude -c avrisp2 -p t13 -v -P usb
avrdude: Version 5.5, compiled on Mar 18 2008 at 20:25:02
Copyright (c) 2000-2005 Brian Dean, http://www.bdmicro.com/
System wide configuration file is "/usr/local/AVRMacPack-20080318/etc/avrdude.conf"
User configuration file is "/Users/tats/.avrduderc"
User configuration file does not exist or is not a regular file, skipping
Using Port : usb:xxx
Using Programmer : avrisp2
avrdude: usbdev_open(): did not find any (matching) USB device "usb"The trick was to unplug and replug the USB cable, it then detected the programmer:
avrdude: Version 5.5, compiled on Mar 18 2008 at 20:25:02
...
Using Port : usb
Using Programmer : avrisp2
avrdude: usbdev_open(): Found AVRISP mkII, serno: 0000B0018274
Second problem: Nothing happening
But then it jammed, nothing was happening. Following this article which outlined a similar project, I needed to patch a file in avrdude and thus needed to compile it. Here is the patch that needs to be applied on the stk500v2.c file in the avrdude 5.5 repository:
--- stk500v2.c.orig 2008-04-04 23:41:31.000000000 -0400
+++ stk500v2.c 2008-04-04 23:41:33.000000000 -0400
@@ -480,7 +480,7 @@
DEBUG("STK500V2: stk500v2_getsync()\n");
- if (pgmtype == PGMTYPE_JTAGICE_MKII)
+ if (pgmtype == PGMTYPE_JTAGICE_MKII || pgmtype == PGMTYPE_AVRISP_MKII)
return 0;
retry:I followed these instructions on how to compile libusb and avrdude (with usb support).
Third problem: Too slow
When trying to upload a program to the chip, the transfer would start but it would be way too long (I couldn't wait to see the end in fact).
I found the fix in this post on avrdude-dev. The reason was that
- The firmware was not up to date
- The ISP frequency (clock) was too small
Upgrade the firmware
The easiest way to do this that we found was to upgrade it under Windows. Just plug your AVRISP2 to a PC running Windows and it should upgrade the firmware to the latest available.
Increase the ISP frequency
You can use avrdude to set the ISP period using the interactive interface. You need to use the sck command to set the period. Of course, increasing the frequency means that you need to decrease the period. A value of 10 us usually works.
Example
# avrdude -c avrisp2 -p t13 -P usb -tuF avrdude: AVR device initialized and ready to accept instructions Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.01s avrdude: Device signature = 0xffffff avrdude> sck 10 >>> sck 10 avrdude> parms >>> parms Vtarget : 5.1 V SCK period : 10.37 us avrdude> quit >>> quit avrdude done. Thank you.
WARNING: If you set the ISP frequency to more than 1/4 the CPU frequency, it will fail. In that case just set it to a lower value.
Troubleshooting
"avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1" type error
Always happens to me. The problem shows as:
avrdude: stk500v2_command(): command failed
avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1
Double check connections and try again, or use -F to override
this check.It usually has one of two sources:
- The ISP frequency is wrong (see up)
- The pin used by the ISP programmer (usually the first pin) is connected to something (like a LED or something)
That's it for now!
Other resources
AVR Microcontroller Programming on a Mac Basic instructions for Mac Users