[daedalus]

Hi,

I am having massive problems getting GDTool to work. Most of the time it has a connection error opening the drive. If the drive opens, and I download the settings from it, I get garbage values (65k+ for every field, every fault light on, etc). If I restart the program, reconnect without downloading, set some sane values, then try to program the drive it has a connection error, and I get to start again.

only once was I able to program settings into the drive, and read them back again successfully, out of over 70 attempts now.

I have tried three pcs, one winxp, one win7, one win8
I have tried 3 different FTDI dongles (all supplied by GD)
and two different XE model drives
I have also tried powering the drives off a 12v bench supply to rule out power supply problems.

Anyone else had similar problems??
also my XE model drives are from a year or two back (have sat in storage as project they were purchased for never happened). It says fw version 199, is there newer firmware available?

failing that is GDTool3 nearly done? I saw fixing connection issues was on the feature list.

I have attached the dump from gdtool event log, error has been the same every time ive checked.

[daedalus]

forgot to mention, also tried ferrite cores on ftdi cable. No motor has been connected during these tests.

[daedalus]

ok, im an idiot, when the software asks you to turn off/on drive power, I was toggling HV whilst leaving 12v connected. Looks like you don't need HV on, and its 12v you should toggle. Doing that it connected first time.

[Xerxes]

Yes, 12V powering is the key here Another common error is to have a flat cable connected to CMD connector while trying to use USB adapter. CMD cable must be unplugged before plugging USB.