Fixed and solved. The 2 problems I had which compounded the problem were : 1. I didnt know that some modules do not come preprogrammed with any kind of default code - I was expecting a WiFi access point named Espressif but got none. Some modules just come with "Invalid Header 0xFFFFFFFF" and they ab...

20240820_151737.jpg I put in a little 0.5 ohm shunt right before the via that goes up to the Vcc pin of the ESP32C3 module. A little stack of 2 ohm resistors. Last night I was only measuring the input to the regulator, but now measuring directly by using the new improvised shunt. The measured curre...

You got me thinking about the boot problem - I dont have an oscilloscope handy, however I did stick a giant 2200 uF electrolytic capacitor between 3v3 and GND. Thinking that might stabilize the voltage just in case there was a problem on the regulator out put ..... annnnnd ... exact same problem. 6 mA

Alright so I took a dremmel tool and obliterated one line going to GPIO2 just in case it was pulling it down in voltage at all, since the technical reference manual also specifies that GPIO2 must be high for any kind of boot. Did that. Checked with the voltmeter. Perfect 3.3v on GPIO2, 3.3V on GPIO8...

sm1_schematic_in_png_format2.png What's the deal with GPIO2 ? Sorry I didnt know there was a GPIO2 requirement as well. Here is the schematic - at least the parts that I can show. Nothing weird about the circuit. I can try again to look for ripple on the Vcc line but it looked amazingly clean and t...

Monitor is good - I use it daily on other ESP32C3 circuits. On top of trying the 115200 monitor built in to VS-Code terminal, I also closed that and tried PuTTY. PuTTY gave no response at 115200 baud, and only a single wavy block ascii character at 921600 baud (which I have seen before as an artifac...

Used a 1.5 ohm shunt directly off the LiPo battery at 4.2 V (regulator was consistently outputting 3.30V clean clean throughout the test). On the input-to-regulator side, started at 6 mA (milliamps) when reset not held in. Once reset held in, total input current drops to 0.26 mA (260 uA). Then after...

Also this isnt just one module. I had 2 prototypes that were done by JLCPCB. The modules are dead-center perfectly aligned on the PCB. So I tried 2 different PCBs with the module and got the same wrong results

I had them done by JLCPCB so I'm really concerned that there might be bad ESP32-C3-mini modules out there. I've done several other designs with the exact same module and no problems at all. JLCPCB usually does an amazing job with the soldering. And normally they have very good component stock. It's ...

Yes you do - and I have another button which controls that pin. I have tried pulling it low as well, but still there is nothing on TX. Even if it was left HIGH the TX should say something when reset is triggered, like "cant find vector of code" or whatever it says when there is no code on the flash ...