After flashing no new Access Point ESP_0 !!

[alen]

Hi guys,

I bought following NodeMcu: https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B01BGQ ... UTF8&psc=1

I've flashed it with version 78 using following instructions:http://www.esp8266.nu/index.php/Tutoria ... are_Upload

(I've used flash.cmd on Windows10). It looks like the flashing process was successful (see screenshot)

But still I can't see any new WiFi access point with a SSID called ESP someting..I've powered off and on again the NodeMcu a few time. But still no luck.

What could be wrong?

many thanks

Alen

02-06-2016 01-09-21.jpg (139.64 KiB) Viewed 30048 times

[dduley]

Hi guys,

I bought following NodeMcu: https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B01BGQ ... UTF8&psc=1

I've flashed it with version 78 using following instructions:http://www.esp8266.nu/index.php/Tutoria ... are_Upload

(I've used flash.cmd on Windows10). It looks like the flashing process was successful (see screenshot)

But still I can't see any new WiFi access point with a SSID called ESP someting..I've powered off and on again the NodeMcu a few time. But still no luck.

What could be wrong?

many thanks

Alen


02-06-2016 01-09-21.jpg

Hi Alen,

First, WOW! you paid a lot for your NodeMCU but that's neither her nor there.

Try using a serial program like Putty to monitor the output from the ESP USB serial port when you press reset. The initial boot message from the ESP bootloader will be at 74880 baudrate. The data rate will change to 115K baud and the ESPEasy log messages should start up. You should see something like "Entering AP Mode" (Sorry I am not in front of one of my ESP units at the moment to give you exact output). If you see that message then the ESP will be in access point mode waiting for you to connect and access 192.168.4.1.

Do you have anything connected to the NodeMCU module? Anything on GPIO 0,2 or 15? You may be inadvertently placing the ESP into flash mode or some other mode. These pins must be used with care so the unit starts up properly.

Regards

Dave

[alen]

Hi Dave

Many thanks for your quick reply!

Ok I've connected to my ESP with putty via USB cable/COM4 (I set the baudrate to 11500).
This is the output I see in putty:


INIT : Booting Build nr:78
WIFI : No SSID!
INIT : I2C
INIT : Boot OK
INIT : Normal boot
WD : Uptime 0 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24728
WD : Uptime 1 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24696
WD : Uptime 1 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24664
WD : Uptime 2 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24632


Does this look ok to you ? It does not say anything about "Entering AP Mode"...


Somewhere I was reading you could use the settings command in the terminal to get more information. I've entered "settings" in putty followed by the ENTER key. But nothing happens.


I've have not connected anything to my nodemcu. All pins are free.

Many thanks
Alen

[dduley]

Hi Dave

Many thanks for your quick reply!

Ok I've connected to my ESP with putty via USB cable/COM4 (I set the baudrate to 11500).
This is the output I see in putty:


INIT : Booting Build nr:78
WIFI : No SSID!
INIT : I2C
INIT : Boot OK
INIT : Normal boot
WD : Uptime 0 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24728
WD : Uptime 1 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24696
WD : Uptime 1 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24664
WD : Uptime 2 ConnectFailures 0 FreeMem 24632


Does this look ok to you ? It does not say anything about "Entering AP Mode"...


Somewhere I was reading you could use the settings command in the terminal to get more information. I've entered "settings" in putty followed by the ENTER key. But nothing happens.


I've have not connected anything to my nodemcu. All pins are free.

Many thanks
Alen

Hi Alen,

Make sure Putty is set for no flow control. The Settings command should bring up a list of settings. The Reset command should put ESPEasy back to virgin state. Sometimes I have had to issue a Reset command after a firmware upload to get things working.

At least you are not seeing stack dumps. That usually means something went very wrong.


Regards

Dave

[alen]

I've changed the option "Flow Control" to "None" in Putty under Connections > Serial.
But the putty windows does not still accept any input. When I type somethings it's not beeing displayed in the putty terminal. Is this expected behaviour ?

In regards to the reset. On my ESP module there is a reset button which I pressed a few times...does this have the same effect as issuing the reset button?
There is a flash button on my ESP module.

Many thanks
Alen

[lucaberta]

Hi Dave
At least you are not seeing stack dumps. That usually means something went very wrong.

you're telling me, Dave!

That's precisely what I am getting on my NodeMCU v1.0 with R107 and R106 alike, constant reboots and stack dumps...

For alen, it's important to understand why you seem to be unable to send characters to your NodeMCU.

Make sure you understand where the problem is, then you can do a basic configuration from the CLI by giving these commands:

• wifiscan (scans for SSID of nearby access points and returns the RSSI, -40 is a strong signal, -80 a weak one)
  wifissid (tells ESPEasy which SSID to use)
  wifikey (tells ESPEasy which WPA key to use)
  wificonnect (connects to the wifi networks)
  save (saves the parameters to flash)
  settings (shows some basic parameters such as IP address and SSID/key)

Let us know if you sort out your issues!

Bye, Luca

[alen]

Hi Luca

I also wonder why I can't enter any characters in the putty terminal. Are you guys all using putty?
Is there another (better?) terminal software I could try?

Thanks
Alen

[egkman]

Hi,

I used the Arduino serial console @ 115k, works fine.

About the lost ESP0 SSID: i had to issue the 'reset' command from the console, as this clears the ESP EEPROM and loads the ESPEasy ' factory standard' values. It seemed that still old values were stored in there.
After this ESP0 was visible.

[alen]

Ok, there are some 'good' news. I have to type a command (withoug seeing it) and press ctrl+j in putty. Doing so I can run commands against my Nodemcu using putty.
The command "settings" returns an ip address: 0.0.0.0
when I run a "wifiscan" I get followinge feedback:

WIFI: SSIS SCAN START
WIFI: No networks found

But there are several wifi's available!

Could it be that build 78 is not compatible with my Nodemcu ?

@egkman: Good hint - I'll give the reset command a try

Regards
Alen

[alen]

ok running the reset command with followed by a power off/power has not helped...
any other ideas ? Could it be that the wlan module is turned off ? Is there a command to turn it off/on ?

[lucaberta]

ok running the reset command with followed by a power off/power has not helped...
any other ideas ? Could it be that the wlan module is turned off ? Is there a command to turn it off/on ?

strange. What NodeMCU version do you have? 0.9 or 1.0?

I have 1.0 and it comes with 4Mbit of flash, so you should have used the 4M binary from the R78 release.

As far as I know there is no wifi on/off switch, though it did happen to me earlier today to also do a scan which reported no wifi APs, which is absurd as I have at least 2 at a few centimeters of distance.

Why don't you try using the Arduino GUI to talk to your NodeMCU anyway?

L

[tozett]

try to set wifi-settings on the serial montior.
cmds are listed here befor in the thread.
do another cold-reboot (power off/on)?...
see if this helps..

[alen]

Good morning all,

Still no progress – still now access point visible. I’ve flashed it many times, followed by a reset and cool reboot (power off/on)

I have following device:

ESP8266 ESP12-E NodeMcu V2

Ordered it at Amazon: https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B01BGQ ... UTF8&psc=1

I’ve used the 4M firmware (build 78).

I’ve used now the Serial Monitor from Ardiuno to talk to my NodeMCU – which works fine..I’ve also ran the wifiscan command using the serial monitor. But nothing is found.

I’ve tried to upload the esp easy firmware using Arduino – but I get a compiler error.

I’ve order 2 identical Nodecus from Amazon of which I’ve given one to a friend of mine. But for him everything works perfectly. After flashing ESP easy (the same way as I did) he can see the access point. This make me believe that the WLAN chip might be broken on my NodeMCU ?!

What else could I try? Is there a way to wipe the firmware completely before flashing again?

Or maybe I could upload the original nodemcu firmware just to be sure the Access Point will then appear…

Many thanks
Alen

[kr0815]

Are you sure your WIFI is in the 2.4 GHz range ?
Try to take your ESP to your friend ?
I´d say, the hardware is broken

[lucaberta]

Alen,

you might want to try to reflash the ESP with the AT commands firmware, it did fix some issues I had with a few boards.

The firmware can be found here:
http://www.electrodragon.com/w/File:V1. ... re.bin.zip

Click on the first link and the ZIP file will download.

You will need to flash the file starting from address 0x0, and it's only one file to upload. I use esptool.py very effectively on a Linux machine, but I guess the same would work on Windows:
https://github.com/themadinventor/esptool

Other flashing tools will work too, obviously. YMMV.

More information on the AT firmware is here:
http://www.electrodragon.com/w/ESP8266_AT_Commands

Once you have the firmware up and running, go to the serial console and type AT followed by return, you will get an OK if all is well.

Then try AT+GMR (all in upper case) and you will get the firmware version. You can try then with AT+RST and you will reset the firmware to the defaults.

The you might want to give these two commands:

AT+CWMODE=3
AT+CWLAP

The latter will perform a wifi scan. If you still don't see any wifi access points, then you do have an issue on the wifi part of the chip.

If all this works well, then I would suggest to go back to flashing ESPeasy and see if it works now.

Let us know how things work out for you!

Ciao, Luca

[alen]

Hi Luca

Many thanks for your help. I flashed the AT command firmware and connected to my chip using Serial Monitor.
Please find below a screenshot what happens when I entered the commands:

AT+CWMODE=3
AT+CWLAP

The CWLAP command does not return any AP's ...it just returns "OK".

[lucaberta]

Hi Luca

Many thanks for your help. I flashed the AT command firmware and connected to my chip using Serial Monitor.
Please find below a screenshot what happens when I entered the commands:

AT+CWMODE=3
AT+CWLAP

The CWLAP command does not return any AP's ...it just returns "OK".

today I had some issues with wifi signal too here in my lab, where I have a couple of access points within a few centimeters from the ESP board. They simply were not visible to the chip!

I then moved the ESP board a couple of meters, and all of a sudden things started to work. I suspect there are high chances of wifi signal overload to the radio part in the ESP chip.

Try to move the wifi access point or router away from the ESP board, or viceversa, things might start to work!

The AT+CWLAP will take a couple of seconds of sniffing before it outputs anything.

Ciao, Luca

[alen]

Hi Luca,

Still no luck. I've tried different positions. Is not only that I can't find any AP which are available in the room/house. Also I can't see the AP which should be "established" by the chip itself from other devices (i,e. my mobile, notebook)
Is there any other firmware I could flash which would give me AP ? So far I've tried ESP Easy, Command AT, LUA, but nothing works...

Grazie mille!
Alen

[lucaberta]

Hi Luca,

Still no luck. I've tried different positions. Is not only that I can't find any AP which are available in the room/house. Also I can't see the AP which should be "established" by the chip itself from other devices (i,e. my mobile, notebook)

hmmm Alen, I wonder if it's really an hardware problem that you have on that board, at this stage.

Even though you might install yet another firmware, the issue might be very much the same if it's hardware related.

Can you try with any other ESP8266-based hardware at this time, or that NodeMCU is the only ESP8266 you have?

It might be better to see with a fresh board if things would work, or not.

Ciao, Luca

[alen]

Hi Luca

Currently I only have one Nodemcu. I'm still quite new to this area.
I've now ordered another Nodemcu. Let's see whether I'll be more lucky with that one.

Thanks
Alen

[alen]

Ok - I have now a new chip. Flashed it once. And it's working

So it looks like my first chip has a hardware issue...

[lucaberta]

Ok - I have now a new chip. Flashed it once. And it's working

So it looks like my first chip has a hardware issue...

well Alen, glad the remote troubleshooting went in the right direction in the end.

I have also learned a lot by helping you, and have noticed that in many ways ESP8266 is still a little big fragile, and prone to a lot of time being wasted trying to understand why things don't work as expected...

Ciao, Luca