Hello,
I have a question,
I ordered a device with an ESP8266MOD 12-F chip on it,
expecting it to be able to be flashed, using normal uart.
Now I took a closer look and see in the manual that it requires FT232RL which apparently is different.
it has 2 additional connections CTR and CTS.
now I have no issues ordering this adapter. but I have some questions.
It should be possible with other dev boards too.
not sure if I fully understand, but it seems like this works for flashing uart,
not FTDI
FTDI is not a standard, but a brand that produce a lot of different chips, which is used to make a lot of different adapters.
I guess the CTS and CTR is just Clear-To-Send/Receive signals and otherwise it is still just RS232.
https://www.brainboxes.com/faq/what-is-rts-cts-hardware-flow-control
Cts and ctr are connected to gpio0 and reset, so that flashing is easier. With them connected you just click flash and it starts. Without those two you must keep pressed gpio0 and hit reset to manually enter flashing mode and only them click “flash”. Thatky all to it.
sorry, it is not CTR but “DTR” my mistake,
here is some info
https://www.theengineeringknowledge.com/what-is-ftdi-usb/
I tried just not to use those 2 additional pins and press the flash button,
but for some reason that didn’t work.
there is also a reset button, maybe I need the press them both.
I found some pinout
but can’t make why I should press the reset button for flasing. The 2 Additional pins aren’t mentioned either so they migt just connect to ground to those 2 would make sense.
Esp can run in two modes: “normal”- according to your program, or “flashing mode”. Only in flashing mode program can be uploaded/chnged. (You can’t overwrite program if it’s running, correct?) You select which mode to boot into with pressing gpio0 and rebooting esp.
Esp32 boards have these two pins usually connected onboard(if they have usb onboard) so these two pins does this boot procedure for you, esp8266 doesn’t…that’s why you must do it manually.
in the end this helped me
tx → tx and usb power,
i did this using the ftdi adapter, but I think normal uart shoult also work.
only the part where you should not cross wire and separate power is a little strange to me.