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Problem with flashing a MSP430F5510 Chip in Windows 7 environment !

Daniil Moerman
Prodigy 10 points
Other Parts Discussed in Thread: MSP430F5510, CODECOMPOSER

Hallo TI Community,

in my company we use the MSP400F5510 Chip on our boards. The main developer of the boards we use works with MSPDebug (http://mspdebug.sourceforge.net/) to debug his applications. He also uses this tool for the transfer of the compiled programm (the extension of the file is *.hex) to the board. The problem is just that he only use Linux and is not capable using Windows.

Thus the rest of the development and production is based on Windows I have to find a method how to flash our boards with his software in the Windows 7 environment. For this reason we bought the eZ430-RF2500 and download the MSP430 Flasher (http://processors.wiki.ti.com/index.php/MSP430_Flasher_-_Command_Line_Programmer).

The following way i call the application in the console:

MSP430Flasher -n MSP430F5510 -w lightsrc.hex

And thats the answer I get:

Evaluating additional triggers...done
Initializing interface on TIUSB port...done
Checking firmware compatibility...done
Reading FW version...done
Reading HW version...done
Powering up...done
Configuring...done
Accessing device...
 # Selected: MSP430F5510
 # Found:    Device_unknown
 # Exit: 16
 # ERROR 1014: No error
 * Disconnecting from device...
 * ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 * Driver        : closed (No error)
 * ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
*/


For the connection between the board and the eZ430-RF2500 is use "Spy-By-Wire". Our electrical engineer uses the eZ430 USB Interface of his eZ430-Chronos watch combined with the program MSP430Debug (as mentioned above) to put the software from his Linux-PC to the board.

I really hope that there is a way to perform this action in Windows environment and thanks to all of you, who can give me a helpful advice (and please do not try to tell me that Linux is better for this kind of task - i know it :)

Last but not least ... in front of me there is the CD-ROM I got with the eZ430-RF2500 (Titel: MSP430 Ultra-Low Power MCUs). I had installed every application I could find on it on my PC but not a single one seems to provide the functionality I am looking for (or is it who overlocked something important).


Many greets,
Daniil

  • 0
    Genius 3020 points

    Hi,

    If you need to flash a .hex file under windows, there is a company called Elprotronic Inc (http://www.elprotronic.com/) that has an application called FET-Pro430 that will allow you to do this. They have a free version (FET-Pro430 Lite) as well a not free version that has a few more features. We've used the Lite version and it works great.

    HTH,

    Barry

  • 0
    Expert 1610 points

    From the output I think everything should be fine. I haven't tried it for the MSP430F5510, but as a hint are you using (other) wires to connect your board to the eZ430? If so, how long are they (each)? Spy-Bi-Wire is critical on the overall wire length and they should be as short as possible and of equal length for both SBW wires.

    To check if only the MSP430Flasher is not working, you could download a copy of CodeComposer Studio and try to communicate with your board from there.

    Since you are obviously in a company, I for myself am more confident with a "real" MSP430FET-UIF pod for programming and debugging my applications. Of course it is a bit more expensive but a real JTAG programmer (also capable of SBW) and works like a charm with windows. Indeed I'm really a linux/un*x guy but found programming microcontrollers with a real IDE from the vendor (CodeComposer Studio for example, or IAR) much more productive - so there is a virtual windows running in a window ;-)

  • 0
    Guru 227245 points

    Daniil Moerman said:
    In my company we use the MSP400F5510 Chip on our boards. [...] For this reason we bought the eZ430-RF2500

    I'm not quite sure that the firmwar eof the EZ430-RF2500 supports 5x family devices (even though having SBW protocol).

    The FET needs to exactly know th eMSP it shall access. Due to differences in ram, flash controller, even teh EMM that controls the CPU. If the target MSP is not known to the FET firmware, you cannot use the FET for this device.

    AFAIK, teh EZ430-RF2500 FET isimilar to the LaunchPad FET, whcih too only supports 2x family devices.

    Only the 'real' FET430UIF supports all MSPs.

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