mBot 2.4G Wireless Serial Not working on Windows 10

#1

Hi There, I bought two mBots (on for me and one for my 7 year old sister) for Christmas. Everything works great except for the 2.4G Wireless Serial USB.

I’ve tried just about everything and it just will not work, which to be honest, was a huuuuge part of the appeal of the mBot, I specifically chose the Wifi module instead of the Bluetooth one because it was supposed to be easer.

Here’s what’s happening:

I plug in the USB Stick, I get a window saying "please wait while we install your RF UART Driver.

Once that’s installed I can see it in my “Devices and Printers” window:

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Next I turn the mBot, the blinking wifi light turns blue, then I open up the mBlock scratch program, I can see the 2.4G option, and I click connect:

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All good so far. Next I make a program for mBot to run and I click the green flag, and nothing happens. So I click in to “upload to arduino” and click the “Upload to Arduino” button I get the following error:

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I’ve updated the firmware too.

I’m at a loss at what to do here, I’ve also tried it on a Windows 7 machine and I get the same results. It works fine with the USB cable, but as I mentioned above I just don’t think I can get the most out of it with my sister without being able to program it wirelessly…

Has anyone run into the same problem? Are there older builds of the mBlock software I can try out? I thought it might have just been a weird Windows 10 problem but I’m seeing the exact same on a Windows 7 machine.

Any help would be greatly appreciated as again, it’s meant to be a christmas present for my lil sis.

Thanks in advance!

Edit: I’ve noticed the “hardware” associated with the RF UART device are just a USB Input Device and HID-compliant device… is this normal?

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#2

If you are trying to run the mBot from the IDE, you will need to put a “when clicked” hat block from the events menu in place of the mBot program hat block. The “mBot Program” hat block is used for standalone program operation and can only be uploaded via the USB serial cable.

#3

I have exactly the same issue as described here. Also running windows 10.

#4

I have a similar problem. I don’t get an error message like the original poster, I just get nothing at all.
My program uses the ‘press button’ or ‘click green flag’ start conditions. With the hardwired USB cable, the program executes as expected, but with the 2.4G link I get no reaction from the mBot.
My RF UART device also shows as "HID-compliant device and “USB Input Device”.

#5

Hello,
I don’t speak english very well. I’m french.
I use mbot + windows 10 + mblock v3.2.2 .
I thought to have the same problem but …
I success to use the 2.4G wireless serial with small programs.
for example :
When (green flag) clicked
set motor M1 speed 50
set motor M2 speed 50
set led led on board all red 60 green 0 blue 0

Sometimes my program doesn’t work because of a bad instruction.
for example : I tried a condition “if button=pressed then set led led on board all red 0 green 60 blue 60” but it didn’t walk. I think my condition is not good.

I hope it will help you. :slightly_smiling:
Enjoy Mbot !

#6

I’m teaching a class and today we installed mBlock on several laptops. As part of the exercise, I had them use the WiFi connection to demonstrate how that works. This was our installation sequence:

  1. Install the mBlock IDE
  2. From the Connect menu in mBlock, Install the Arduino driver.
  3. Connect the mBot via the USB cable.
  4. From the Connect menu in mBlock, click on the Serial Port menu item and select the appropriate serial port (usually COM3 or COM4).
  5. From the Connect menu in mBlock, Upgrade Firmware.
  6. From the Connect menu in mBlock, Reset Default program.
  7. From the Connect menu in mBlock, in the Serial Port submenu, click the selected COM port to disconnect.
  8. From the Connect menu, select 2.4G Serial, click Connect.

All of the students were able to execute programs from within mBlock using the When [green flag" Clicked block. They turned the LEDs on and off, made noises, and controlled the motors.

Hope this helps.

#7

Try as I might I cannot get the wi-fi connection to do anything.
I can confirm that the blue light on the wifi module is not flashing but is steady.
However I note that under “Connect” next to 2.4G serial the option “connect” cannot be ticked.
Is this a sign that something is not right? Should I have installed some sort of driver for the 2.4G wifi on the laptop?

Any help appreciated.

Thanks.

#8

If you are connected via WiFi, your connection to the mBot will be under the 2.4G Serial menu item (Connect->2.4G Serial) where you should be offered an option to connect. The plain Serial menu item is for connecting with the USB cable.

Based on your comment about the blue light being steady, I’m assuming that your WiFi dongle is plugged in, correct? I’m wondering if it is a driver issue, a firewall issue, or something else… :frowning:

Does your Windows 10 system see the dongle in the network adapter settings?

#9

Thanks for the advise. I tried again thus time with my other laptop and the tick next to “connect” worked fine. After that I managed to use the when flag pressed hat block so that is sorted.
I still need to work out why it doesn’t work on my other laptop though.

#10

Sounds like some sort of driver issue. :frowning:

#11

dear all
how can use this wifi with C# code in visual studio 2015?I need to connect my bot using wifi from vs

#12

Just another thought, the COM port that shows up may be different on each laptop. Try another COM port to see if that is the case.

#13

Hi
How do use 2.4G serial with C++ code in visual studio 2015? Does anyone here have tries before?

Thnaks
Hao

#14