Thursday 1 December 2016

Arduino not getting detected, USB2.0-Serial issue

Since Arduino hardware is open source, it is manufactured and marketed by different vendors. If you have ordered a cheap Arduino clone from a chinese makers like Luxshare Precision Ltd, chances are that they come with the cheaper CH340 USB to Serial chip. This is a cheap chip that manufacturers exploit to make the clone a lot cheaper. This can also be a downside. When you connect this device to Windows XP/7/8 systems you will end up with the message “USB 2.0 serial driver is not installed properly” and if you go to “Computer(right click) -> Manage -> Device manager ->Portable Devices”, you will see the following:


                        
This is because there are no proper USB drivers (like CH340) to detect portable devices on COM ports.

Solution:
To solve this you just have to install CH340 driver (download here).
Extract this download and install by double clicking on SETUP.EXE
After installation you will see a COM port assigned to the Arduino board attached to your USB port as below: (Computer (right click) -> Manage -> Device manager ->Portable Devices)
                


Now if you go to Arduino IDE we can see the COM number port to which Arduino is connected.



 Now try loading any example sketch (like Blink).  Enjoy…!!!!