OzStick Posted July 16, 2016 Share Posted July 16, 2016 I got these panels a few weeks back from the supplier on Ali Express recommended by UncleSash, but I can't get it all to work. Here is a pic showing the back of the panels and the data cables and power wiring: As far as I can tell this is all correct according to the PDF instructions so it should work. However, when I connect it to the Shield, which is plugged in to my PC, then power up the panels, I get a blank display: Certainly not what I was expecting after the painless process I went through with my first test panel (which I purchased from Angela on Ali Express when they were still supplying the correct RGB panels). I spent some more time rechecking wiring an ribbon cables, I also checked the voltage of the power supply which spot on at 5.03V but couldn't see anywhere I went wrong. For some reason I decided to unplug the ribbon cable and I wasn't expecting anything different but I got this: Sorry about the poor quality, but what you see are random horizontal lines on both panel and these were scrolling left to right, sometimes changing colour but mostly an intense white. It's a pity I don't have anything capable of taking video otherwise it may have helped to explain it a little better. It happens that I had two pair of panels I bought at the same time from this supplier, so I swapped over to that pair and got the same result!! Am I doing something fundamentally wrong here? As I said I have another panel that was purchased from a different supplier and it has been working perfectly on my testbench for literally months without putting as much as a pixel wrong. So for this to happen with two consecutive pairs of panels form elsewhere has me worried that they are faulty. To top it all off, it now appears that this supplier is no longer doing business through Ali Express. I thought I should touch base with them and explain what I have experienced to see if they have any suggestions, only to track back through my order and find that this particular product is no longer available, as you can see here: http://www.aliexpress.com/item/P2-5-Indoor-full-color-LED-module-1-16-scan-SMD-2121-3in1-RGB-160-160mm/32626722058.html I then went and looked at their store, which contains no products at all! I have messaged them via Ali Express, but I don't like my chances of getting a reply. If anyone has any suggestions for me getting these panels running then I'd be most grateful to hear them. Cheers, Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted July 16, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted July 16, 2016 Is a firmware on the device ? Do you get a red LED between the buttons when no SD card is inserted ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 17, 2016 Author Share Posted July 17, 2016 Is a firmware on the device ? Do you get a red LED between the buttons when no SD card is inserted ? Yes I have v2.29 firmware successfully installed on the device. - device connected to PC by Micro-USB, NOT connected to LED panel, there is NO Red Light between the buttons. - device connected to PC by Micro-USB, connected to LED panel via data cable and LED Panel NOT powered, there is again NO Red Light between the buttons. - device connected to PC by Micro-USB, connected to LED panel via data cable and LED Panel IS powered, there is again NO Red Light between the buttons. Am I missing something with the loading of the firmware? Are the LED panels supposed to do a weird light show if you power them up without being connected to any sort of data device? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 17, 2016 Author Share Posted July 17, 2016 OK I have now made some progress, although I'm still stuck. As per the post by Lucky1 earlier I decided to do some further testing. To begin with I decided it would be a good idea to swap the Shield and Discovery board from my test unit onto this one, plugged it into the same PC (Micro-USB only) and voila - all LEDs lit up on the boards and there was an image on the panel as expected. Next I swapped back over to the new boards, plugged it in via Micro0USB only and - nothing. I then did a "Erase Chip" via the ST-Link and reinstalled the v2.29 Firmware. At that point I noticed that all of the lights were illuminated on the Discovery board, presumably due to having both the Mini-USB cable plugged in instead of the Micro-USB. So I then left the Mini-USB cable connected and then I plugged in the Micro-USB and what do you know - all the lights stayed on. After that I unplugged the Mini-USB cable and once again, all the LEDs remained lit. On powering up the panel it correctly displayed the PIN2DMD "splash" screen and started showing the code number on the panel. This was a bit of a "woo-hoo" moment for me as I'm not great when it comes to electronics, but it was short lived when I decided to disconnect and reconnect the Micro-USB cable, at which point it went back to the LED between the two buttons not lighting up and, upon checking Devices and Printers the PIN2DMD device no longer showed up. The Shield hardware on my test unit, which uses an older version of the Discovery board, works perfectly well with just the Micro-USB cable connected. Another thing I've noticed with the newer Discovery board is that when connecting it via Mini-USB my PC detects it as a Data Drive: What I'm thinking is that this is power related, because if it was data/signal related then how is it that the unit keeps working after I unplug the Mini-USB cable? Should I try switching the Shield to External power and run 5v and GND to it from the power supply I use for the LED panels? Is it safe to feed 5v to the Shield at the same time as the Discovery board being connected to the PC with the Micro-USB cable? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted July 17, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted July 17, 2016 That seems to be the bug caused by the firmware of the debugging interface st-link of the latest discovery boards. You need to update to the latest firmware using this tool http://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/products/embedded-software/development-tool-software/stsw-link007.html It is also written on pin2dmd.com here http://pin2dmd.com/installation/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rablack97 Posted July 17, 2016 Share Posted July 17, 2016 Yes, i just recieved my new boards and it took me awhile to get it to work as well. Make sure your pin setting for power is bridged with the first 2 pins closest to the grey cable, and use the micro usb. That will give you power and data flow. Also did you load your lib 32 drivers, for the Pin2DMD? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 18, 2016 Author Share Posted July 18, 2016 That seems to be the bug caused by the firmware of the debugging interface st-link of the latest discovery boards. You need to update to the latest firmware using this tool http://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/products/embedded-software/development-tool-software/stsw-link007.html It is also written on pin2dmd.com here http://pin2dmd.com/installation/ Thanks for that - I was working off the instructions from a PDF that is obviously older than the instructions on pin2dmd.com. Just out of interest, can I achieve the same thing from the standard ST-Link utility by going to the ST-LINK menu and selecting Firmware Upgrade from there? If not, then where do I unzip the contents of the other tool? I've read the instructions included in the ZIP, all the release notes etc from www.st.com and none of them explain where to unzip the files! Just to be certain, the board in question is the STM32F407G-DISC1 which I sourced from here: http://au.rs-online.com/web/p/processor-microcontroller-development-kits/9107951/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rablack97 Posted July 18, 2016 Share Posted July 18, 2016 This is the latest firmware V2.J27.M15 STM32 Debug+Mass storage Should be able to zip to desktop....I just unzipped and ran the exe and was able to upgrade, but my board already had that firmware loaded to it, i guess unclesash updated it for me. The zip file contains a .exe and the USB driver Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 18, 2016 Author Share Posted July 18, 2016 This is the latest firmware V2.J27.M15 STM32 Debug+Mass storage Should be able to zip to desktop....I just unzipped and ran the exe and was able to upgrade, but my board already had that firmware loaded to it, i guess unclesash updated it for me. The zip file contains a .exe and the USB driver Cool, I'll take a look at it. Hopefully this is the last kink in the chain for me! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 18, 2016 Author Share Posted July 18, 2016 More issues!!! I used the tool suggested by lucky1 and updated the Discovery board Firmware and now, when I plug the unit in via Micro-USB it gives me a USB Device Not Recognised error and when I run Zadig it shows up as Unknown Device instead of PIN2DMD. Where do I go now?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted July 18, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted July 18, 2016 The firmware upgrade of the ST-Link debugging interface (Mini USB) doesn´t have anything to do with the STM32F4 PIN2DMD fimware. It is even running on two different processors. You just need to start ST-LinkUpgrade.exe , connect to the device connected through the miniusb and hit yes. Try uploading the pin2dmd firmware again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 18, 2016 Author Share Posted July 18, 2016 OK, I've done some more testing and now I'm more confused than ever! I ran the ST-LinkUpgrade again, then followed up by reloading v2.29 PIN2DMD Firmware again, closed the ST-Ling utility then connected the Micro-USB cable and STILL got the same USB Device Not Recognised error as before. I thought it may not be uploading the firmware properly (even though the status log at the bottom of the ST-Link utility showed it as successful) so I restarted the ST-Link utility, went to Target and selected Target memory compare with file. The process does exactly that and produces a split screen with the results. As soon as the compare was completed it popped up an error message: So I then scrolled down the results to find where these differences were and I found a huge block where the device memory was different to the firmware file. THe data starts out being identical between the device and the firmware file, then as you can see, it starts to become different at 0x08008000: ...... it eventually finishes at 0x0000FFF0 after which the data is once again identical: All the data after that point is identical right to the last address. I have no idea what any of that means, but it doesn't seem like it should happen like that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted July 19, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted July 19, 2016 I have no idea what any of that means, but it doesn't seem like it should happen like that! It should, because that area gets initialized by setting to FF when the firmware is started the first time and the area is not initialized That is not the root of your problem. Do you get a picture on the panels ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted July 19, 2016 Author Share Posted July 19, 2016 I managed to get it working!!!! No idea what the heck was going on, but after a reboot of the PC and then re-doing the ST-Link Firmware Update it automatically detected the unit as a PIN2DMD when i plugged in the Micro-USB. I had a spare Discovery board still in its package that I was holding onto and I simply swapped it over, ran the ST-Link Firmware upgrade, programmed the PIN2DMD Firmware then plugged it in to Micro-USB and it worked as well! Sorry for all the smoke and mirrors but it seems that the issue was "something" with my desktop PC. A big heads-up for you Lucky1 - the ST-Link Firmware Updater you have linked in your documentation is the same version as that included with the ST-Link Utility. I confirmed this by using it to update the firmware on my spare Discovery board. That means for anyone downloading the ZIP file stsw-link004 it contains STM32 ST-LINK Utilityv3.9.0.exe which includes the correct version of the Firmware Update program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mgpasman Posted August 14, 2016 Share Posted August 14, 2016 I had the exact same problem, when I was trying to flash new FW to my older version board, and ST-Link helpfully proposed me to update the FW of the discovery board. Luckily I found this post and fixed it on my own. What I find remarkable, is that apparently the display will boot (and work!) with 5v from mini USB only. I am fairly sure my netbook does not supply 10A of power, does this mean I should be able to power it from one of the 5V leads from the pin? Edit: decided to give this question its own thread: http://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/2667-powering-pin2dmd-from-dmd-power-source/. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OzStick Posted August 17, 2016 Author Share Posted August 17, 2016 I had the exact same problem, when I was trying to flash new FW to my older version board, and ST-Link helpfully proposed me to update the FW of the discovery board. Luckily I found this post and fixed it on my own. What I find remarkable, is that apparently the display will boot (and work!) with 5v from mini USB only. I am fairly sure my netbook does not supply 10A of power, does this mean I should be able to power it from one of the 5V leads from the pin? Edit: decided to give this question its own thread: http://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/2667-powering-pin2dmd-from-dmd-power-source/. Yes it was a firmware related issue - all good now. I also agree re power supply, as I have mine connected to a 5VDC 3A plug pack and it works perfectly well. Even when being driven heavily with every pixel lit up brightly it displays as well as expected. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mgpasman Posted August 19, 2016 Share Posted August 19, 2016 Yes it was a firmware related issue - all good now. I also agree re power supply, as I have mine connected to a 5VDC 3A plug pack and it works perfectly well. Even when being driven heavily with every pixel lit up brightly it displays as well as expected. Where did you take the 5VDC from? Directly from power supply, or from powerboard/dmd connector? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
draziw1 Posted December 19, 2016 Share Posted December 19, 2016 Ok I'm having similar problems with Pin2DMD with FW v2.29 pre-installed. I had gotten 2 complete setups and ordered the panels from Alibaba which meet all the specs required, although the panels came as 160mm x 160mm which I cut in half....not really just the mounting frame :-) I too followed the PDF instructions on how to put the pieces together AND nothing! OK, whats going on here! Tried the other setup with the panels I used before, again nothing. Re-checked my connections and now and then when I moved the unit a few leds would light brightly and stay lit until I turned power off. Power supply is a 5V 10A. I have the panels as well as the ST Board powered by it, using the ext power header. tried all I could think off to get this to work. Hunted for answers but no definitive solution was found. So thinking I got a batch of defective panels I put the DMD part of my build on hold as I didn't want to pay another $100 for panels that may or may not work. That was last August. I then Googled this past week on how to test these Led Panels and I found someone had used the Raspberry Pi's to control these. Having 4 of them kicking around I decided to try that route. No success that way either. So the forgone conclusion I came too was that these panels were junk. Going thru all the documentation I had I noticed that the ST Board had a micro SD card in it. Tried finding out if the card needed programming or be prepared in someway but again it wasn't clear either way. So I installed an old 2g Micro SD into the slot, plugged in the power supply and low and behold the display lit up displaying the Demo. YES!!! So lesson I learned from that was it needed the SD card to work although I didn't prepare it in any other way. Well at last the panels were working, but still with a downside. When I pulled power from the DMD Shield it left brightly fragmented leds randomly on the panels. Have to actually shut down the pwr supply to turn everything off. So I rushed out and install the setup into my cabinet, Looks Damn Good. To try and eliminate the left behind leds after shutting down I supplied power using the computers power supply but didn't solve that problem. So I have ordered power relays. Using these I will be able to turn the computer on and have it supply DC power to the relay and it in turn supply AC to the dedicated power supply, which in turn will supply DC to the panels as well as the ST/DMD shield. Shutting down the cabinet will also shut down the power supply thus stopping the condition described. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
draziw1 Posted December 19, 2016 Share Posted December 19, 2016 So where do I find the FW 2.29 file so I can try to redo the firmware. I did have some recognition problems but using the supplied drivers in the Master file kit solved that. Now its being recognized as a ST-Link debug. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted December 19, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted December 19, 2016 I just read your post and really can´t figure out what the current state of your problem is. SD Card is definitely is only for the pin2dmd to startup. I could imagine that you ran into another problem which is a bug in the ST-Link interface of later discovery boards. Please upgrade your ST-Link firmware using latest ST-Link Utility -> Tab ST-LINK -> firmware upgrade. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
draziw1 Posted December 19, 2016 Share Posted December 19, 2016 The current state at the moment is that I'm not getting anything thing to display using the second setup #2D004000085152 that is until I unplug the power from wall socket as you will see in the two videos. The panel that you see here is the same one that is lit in the previous post. I hadn't split this apart as I didn't know if I'd had to send them back. There's something going on. In the above post the first picture is of the unit I'm currently trying to get to work now, the others are of the working unit and displaying on all panels, so I know the panels are working. As for the boards, they were bought at the same time, updated firmware put on by the seller. This particular board has MB997D stamped on it, you can see it in the pic. Pulling pwr plug.mp4 unpluging PWR.mp4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
draziw1 Posted December 19, 2016 Share Posted December 19, 2016 One improvement I would suggest is a push push MicroSD adapter for ease of installation of the SD card. Speaking of the SD card being needed for the Pin2DMD , yet the one I have is out of an old phone with all the android programming still on it?? So what do I need to prepare the SD card and why. It works in one setup and not the other?? Anyway gotta go finish building my Rocket Ship :-)) not really but I do need to goto work!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted December 19, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted December 19, 2016 8 hours ago, lucky1 said: I just read your post and really can´t figure out what the current state of your problem is. SD Card is definitely is only for the pin2dmd to startup. I could imagine that you ran into another problem which is a bug in the ST-Link interface of later discovery boards. Please upgrade your ST-Link firmware using latest ST-Link Utility -> Tab ST-LINK -> firmware upgrade. Did you do this ? I wrote on http://pin2dmd.com/installation/ !! Note : Latest Discovery boards MB997D may need a ST-Link firmware update from here You can either use the way I described above or this Link. http://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/products/embedded-software/development-tool-software/stsw-link007.html this is not a problem of pin2dmd. It is a problem of your discovery board. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
draziw1 Posted December 29, 2016 Share Posted December 29, 2016 Yes I tried both but what gets me is the Card thats working I can't establish a connection via the ST-Link using any thing. I thought that if I hooked it up to the one that the demo was working on that I might see where the other one was different. No dice. You asked some one if the red led was lit in between the buttons with the sd card out, in the one thats working it is. Just checked the one that won't display the demo and it has that same red led lit. I found out as well that my PC puts out enough voltage to power the board and the display panels, It back feeds the power thru the ext power connector to the power supply which in turns feeds the panels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Content Provider lucky1 Posted December 29, 2016 Content Provider Share Posted December 29, 2016 You need to connect with the mini USB not the micro USB to upgrade the ST-Link Firmware. Powering the panels is absolutely not recommended and may kill your USB !!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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