HiLetgo ESP32 Development Board problem downloading

[W5UXH-NM]

I have just started playing with the ESP-WROOM-32 boards so it is all new to me as of a few days ago. I ordered two boards the same day. One works fine with both Arduino and ESP-IDF. This is the EzSBC board, ordered on eBay. The other, cheaper one, is the HiLetgo ordered on Amazon. This one boots with what I guess is an ESP-IDF project based on what is seen in a terminal emulator connected to the USB connector on the board. Thus the driver for the non-FTDI interface seems to be ok.

I have not been able to get the download to work from either Arduino or ESP-IDF. The board clearly goes into "wait for download" when I press and hold the boot button and press and release the reset button. I can see this over the serial port, at which point I disconnect the terminal emulator connection to free the port up for the IDE. The IDE downloader attempts to connect to the boot loader in the board but times out after a period of time.

The EzSBC board automatically goes into boot mode without the need to press buttons. I considered that perhaps the HiLetgo interface required manually using the buttons to get into boot mode, but it refuses to work, it only times out every time, the same as when I do not use the buttons.

I expect I will just abandon this board since there seems to be zero information on the web about it. But if anyone has a clue as to how to get it to download, at least I will not toss it out.

Thanks,

Chuck

[sabxxx]

This works for me:

1) Do a 'make flash'
2) Wait for the 'Connecting.......' message
3) Press the boot button (not the EN button)

In about a second or two after (3) I see a message that says, 'Chip is ...'. and the code is transfered to the esp32

It took me a while to figure this out.

Good Luck.

Sanjay

[W5UXH-NM]

Thanks for the information Sanjay. I guess it has been a year since I was working with the ESP32 project and I doubt I will go back to any of the modules, but it is good to have the information. I am glad you were able to figure it out though.

Chuck.