?! My ICD2 isn't working!

[Hank Fletcher]

After working perfectly all day yesterday, my ICD2 clone is no longer working in Windows 2000/MPLAB v7.52. When I try to connect to the programmer, I get this error:

Connecting to MPLAB ICD 2
ICD0019: Communications:  Failed to open port: (Windows::GetLastError() = 0x2, 'The system cannot find the file specified.
')
ICD0021: Unable to connect with MPLAB ICD 2
MPLAB ICD 2 Ready

Formerly all I had to do when I first got the programmer was install MPLAB, plug in the programmer, load up MPLAB, and it took care of the driver itself (I think).

What's going on?

 

[blueroomelectronics]

USB or RS232 ICD?

 

[Hank Fletcher]

USB or RS232 ICD?

USB ICD2...

 

[blueroomelectronics]

Open XP's device manager (right click my computer)
Do you see a Microchip Firmware Hub icon? try plugging and unplugging the ICD2 to see if it shows up.

 

[Hank Fletcher]

Open XP's device manager (right click my computer)
Do you see a Microchip Firmware Hub icon? try plugging and unplugging to see if it shows up.

I'm uising Windows 2000, but no, I don't see it but when I plug it back in again, Windows either tries to find a driver for the "new device" or alternatively nothing happens at all. The power light comes on the ICD2 though.

The programmer came with the attached image illustrating what ought to be happening (which I think is what you described).

 

[phil7890]

A computer typically has 3 to 8 USB ports. I think some ICD2 programmers are "port specific" (not made to be universal/PnP for a specific reason that I haven't figured out). You may have to find/use the same USB port that you previously used to install the software and then this ICD2 programmer will suddenly work again... (??) Good luck and have fun.

 

[blueroomelectronics]

Yep you need to see that or the ICD2 will not show up in MPLAB. Some clone firmware for the 18F4550 was flaky and had the possibility of becoming corrupted. A fixed version with BOR reset can be found in the Unicorn page on my site.
That's one of the reasons I split my ICD2 clone into two parts, the 16F877x firmware is pretty solid so if you have a RS232 connector on your ICD2 it might be possible to reflash the 18F4550 (they all use the same firmware)

 

[Hank Fletcher]

Sorry if it's bad form to link to another forum, but I've been looking for answers and came upon this:
Lost ICD driver
which demonstrates that my problem, which appears to be the disappearing icd2w2k.inf driver, is not as rare as we might have hoped. Weird, huh?

I'm going to read up on that a bit more, and a helpfile PDF I found on the Microchip site that describes installing USB drivers for an ICD2 in Windows 2000.

 

[Hank Fletcher]

Okay, the best I've been able to figure out so far is that I need to run Microchips MPUsbClean utility, but in order to do that, it says I need regini.exe to be in my c:\windows\system32 directory. I don't have a windows directory, I have WINNT, and there's no sign of regini.exe anywhere on my computer.

I'm stuck!