PMDX424 not finding smart BOB

[Rambo]

Greetings,

I have finally been able to get to work on my CNC machine after nearly a year. It's all wired in and ready to go however my mach 4 hobby build refuses to communicate to my pmdx-424. I've tried two different cables and all the USB ports.

I looked on the device driver and I see the Intel(R) Active Management Technology SOL(Com3) which according to the manual in support means I have to send you a debug file so sent it to PMDX.

I am thinking that My Altera quartusII  FPGA software driver took over this port and is using it instead of Mach 4 (I am using the usb blaster)  Could this be mistakenly thinking the PMDX-424 is a usb blaster?

That's all I can think of at the moment.  Has anyone else had this issue? If so what fixed it?

Here is an overview of my setup:

I am running an AVID CNC 48x24 standard kit with nema23 steppers. The PMDX 424 is hooked up to 4 DM5565 Leadshine stepper drivers
When turned on the PMDX424 has three amber LED lights on the board that light up, the red LED is solid while the green LED blinks at a 2 second interval.

I made sure to install the smartBOB usb drivers before plugging it in as per the instructions.

Thank you for the help.

[12strings]

Even if your Quartus software was using the PMDX's port (unlikely), it would still show up in Device Manager.

I had a bunch of other questions but then I re-read your post and you say you have 3 amber LEDs that light up.  Do all 3 turn on and stay on?  Are these the "power", "Steps" and "enabled" LEDs?  If they turn on and stay on, something is wrong.

So first thing - disconnect everything from the PMDX-424 except the power input.  What do you see on the LEDs?  Now plug in the USB cable.  Any change?

No on to the rest of the questions:

What version of Windows are you running?

In device manager, so you see any devices anywhere with yellow question marks next to them?  You may need to expand the USB section at the bottom.

The blink pattern on the green LED - is it a very short blink once every 2 seconds?  Or more like same amount of time on as off, or is it on mostly and off for a short time?

[Rambo]

Thank you for the reply.  I did what you said an unplugged everything except the power and turned it on. All three amber LED's are on. They are on, and stay on. my Red LED is constantly on and the Green LED is blinking at a 1 second interval. (Same time on and off 1 second on, 1 second off)

There is no change on the com port 3  It still says Intel(R) Active Management Technology -SOL (Com3)

I am running Windows 7 Professional 6.7.1 build

I checked the power coming into the board, it is 120 VAC exactly, so I am not dropping out of power.

Thank you for your help

[Rambo]

Could this be a grounding issue? The board is not connected to ground at all......

[Rambo]

Nope.... I jumpered the ground to no avail.

[12strings]

What about Device Manager?  Do you see any yellow triangles anywhere (these are devices that didn't properly load)?  You may have to expand the "Universal Serial Bus Controllers" section.

Try the steps here to un-install and re-install the drivers:
https://faq.pmdx.com/content/2/8/en/how-to-manually-install-the-virtual-com-port-driver-version-14.html

You need to know whether your Win7 is 32-bit or 64-bit to know which version of the 1.3.1 driver to run to un-install the current driver.

[Rambo]

Hello,

Thank  you for the help, I see no yellow triangles. I am going to try to manually re-install the port driver today. I'll post a screen shot or two.

Thanks