Windows 10: Unable to connect to USB in-circuit emulator

I'm doing some embedded development targeting an Atmel AVR CPU. The workflow is, I write the program in C, compile it, download it to the chip via a USB-interfaced in-circuit emulator (Atmel-ICE), and it runs in the chip. This was working fine up until a couple of days ago when the IDE stopped being able to connect to the ICE. When I plug the ICE into a USB port, Windows beeps in acknowledgement, and it shows up in device manager (under Atmel > Atmel-ICE Data Gateway). The IDE vendor (Imagecraft) claims this is all they should need to connect to it, but they can tell from a DebugView log that the IDE isn't finding the ICE, so they don't know what the problem is. I've also tried using Atmel's IDE (Atmel Studio), but it has the same problem. So this looks like a Windows issue. I've tried rebooting the PC, disabling Malwarebytes, reinstalling the IDE, and swapping out the ICE for another one, but no luck.

This is really killing me, so I'd really appreciate any pointers. Thanks.

:)

 

WIn7 32-bit:: Unable to connect to WM 6.1 emulator via ActiveSync

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In order to sync with the Windows Mobile 6.1 emulator, you need to install WMDC and this needed to be installed before the emulator. Then once it is installed, there is an additional option for the connections to select DMA which allows you to sync with a
device. Further you have to open the emulator and cradle/uncradle it to begin sync chronization.



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WIn7 32-bit:: Unable to connect to WM 6.1 emulator via ActiveSync

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Hi Involute

Any chance you are using restore points and can restore from a date before the issue started?

If you look under Window Updates, view installed update history, what software or drivers have been installed in the last couple of days?

Are you aware of any other changes, maybe a software update to your AV (Malwarebytes or other), a new product / app you may have installed.

 

All good suggestions, Caledon. Thanks. Unfortunately, the problem appeared on 2/28 (though things were working fine earlier that day), my most recent restore point before then was on 2/26, and Windows fails when trying to restore from it (I've configured Windows now to make a restore point every day, fwiw). My last Windows updates were on the 26th, too, so things shouldn't have been working on the 28th if that were the problem. I can't think of anything else that happened that day that could have triggered this.

I've tried using both ICEs on another system (Win7), and they both fail there, too, so it's possible my hardware killed them both. I know how damning that seems, but I haven't found anything suspicious in the setup. I've ordered a couple of replacements, just in case.

 

Might I suggest you look at Macrium Reflect. It is free and reliable. I would use it instead of restore points.

Will be interesting to see how replacements run.

Good luck.

 

One cure for a device that's not working can be to uninstall it in Device Manager then let windows detect new hardware and reinstall it. I'm not familiar with this device, Windows may not have drivers for it so you may be asked to provide the drivers yourself. Did you have to when you first installed it? If so, make sure you have the drivers to hand before you try.

Then again, your suspicion of a physical failure may be correct. If so, the above won't help *Sad

 

I do a complete system backup every night with Acronis. Unfortunately, it amounts to about 1.5TB, so I can only save one day’s worth on my 4TB external drive (it needs enough space to write the current backup before it deletes the previous one). I might be able to have it back up the Windows folder separately, though, which would allow me to keep more copies of that. Why would that be better than System Restore?

 

The IDE comes with a driver installer just to make sure a user can have the right driver. I’ve run it multiple times, though I haven’t explicitly uninstalled the driver since the installer offers to repair the driver if you run it and it detects it’s already installed. I suppose explicit uninstallation is worth a try.

The new ICE arrives tomorrow, but I’m leery of installing it without knowing how the previous ones got borked first, and nothing’s jumping out at me from my hardware, which is a single chip on a breadboard.

 

Macrium Reflect works, like Acronis. System Restore is iffy, yours just failed, and restore points are deleted with Feature updates. Macrium has ability to backup System components. I don't use Acronis but understand it is a quality product as well.

I bought Macrium and it has image guardian which is supposed to prevent ransomware from attacking backups. (I haven't tested).

I have my system in separate partition and backup weekly.

 

It turns out the ICE was somehow activating both the Atmel Gateway and LIBUSB drivers in Device Manager, and that seems to have been causing the problem. Uninstalling LIBUSB allows the ICE to now be seen by both my IDEs. Problem solved, for now.