Unable to sync

[bino]

Dear forum users,

Recently i've bought a uCam RS232 via Tigal.com. I've supplied the device with a 5V power adapter (conform specifications). Unfortunately I'm unable to sync with the device using the uCam test software (rev2): "Sync [AA 0D 00 00 00 00] response missing\nSync failed, is uCam connected?". I've measured all PINS on the board and the connections are all ok. I've also tested the device with other computers/serial ports. Is it possible this product might be broken, the device has accidentally been shipped as a TTL device or is this a known bug?


Kind regards/m.v.g.,
Bino

[bino]

Update: I've noticed a MAX232 shifter is present on the board, so this is the RS232 version for sure.

[ESPsupport]

Any chance of showing us how you have connected the deviceand to what?

[hjhoover]

I had exactly the same problem with mine. I tried it plugged into the RS232 port on my Windows 7 box, as well as talking to it directly from a USB to serial converter and could not make it sync. Then I carefully inspected the RS232 connector and noticed a single strand bridging the TX line from the camera to one of the pins. Removed that and then the uCam testing software started working.

Note, the docs say that it can take a number of SYNC commands before you get the attention of the camera. I seem to need between 1 and 5.

Also, I found that when the test program got confused and became out of sync with the camera, a power cycle did not always reset the world. I had to physically unplug the RS232 connector, and often had to restart the test program. Who knows where in the chain things got wonky.

I'm now going to try talking to it directly from the Arduino Mega serial ports.

[hjhoover]

Follow up:

I did finally get mine working via USB. The problem is that the RS232 version of the camera does not like TTL levels. You really do need to feed it proper RS232. So I put together the following absurd sequence of translations: USB TTL adapter, connected to a TTL RS232 adapter, connected to the camera, which promptly translates into its own logic levels. I ran the speed all the way up to over 400 kilo baud.

After changing the baud rate you need multiple syncs to attract the camera's attention. If you use the jpeg compression and high speeds you get a pretty decent image download speed.

See the photo of my breadboard below.

Attached files