Flashing the Bus Pirate

This repo contains everything you need to flash a newly assembled Bus Pirate (BP). Flasing the BP using a Linux machine is significantly more simple than using Windows.

Basic steps:

Clone this repository (with subrepos)
Build the PiratePICprog tool (or use the prebuild linux binary)
Connect a working Bus Pirate to the BP to be flashed
Flash
...
Profit...?

Cloning the repository

If you have git installed on your system, it is as simple as running the following from a command line:

git clone --recurse-submodules https://git.scintilla.utwente.nl/shock/BusPirateFlashing

Otherwise go to the BusPirateFlashing repo and the PiratePICProg repo and download both (download > Download zip)

Building the flashing tool

You might be lucky. First test the binaries in the bin folder to see if there is one that works for you. Otherwise you have to build it yourself:

Make sure to have make, cmake and a compiler such as gcc or clang on linux/mac, or MinGW on windows installed on your system. Most linux and mac systems already have this installed. On windows figure this out for yourself...

Now open the PiratePICProg folder in a terminal and run the following commands to build the tool:

cmake CMakeLists.txt
make

If everything went right the output binary should be in the bin folder (picprog). Copy this binary to the BusPirateFlashing folder, where the firmware files are located.

Connecting your flashing BP to the new BP

Bus Pirate	Dir.	New BP	Description
MOSI	→	PGD	Program data
CLK	→	PGC	Clock signal
CS	→	VPP/MCLR	Programming control
GND	⏚	GND	Signal Ground
3.3v/5v	→	VDD	Power (optional)

Flashing the new BP

First you need to find the port of the working BP. Connect it to your computer. Then for linux you can find this using dmesg and look for a line containing tty* where * can by anything:

So for me its ttyACM0. The full address is /dev/ttyACM0.

On windows open Device Manager (search Device Manager or Apparaatbeheer in the start menu) and look for Ports (COM & LPT):

Here the port is COM6.

Now open a terminal in the BusPirateFlashing folder and run the following command:

./picprog -p buspirate -u <YOUR_PORT> -s 115200 -c 24FJ256GB106 -t hex -w bpv4_boot4.10_fw7.0_optS_18092016.hex

If everything went right, you should now have a working Bus Pirate! Now you can update the onboard firmware without any external tools. For more information and the most up to date firmware visit the Bus_Pirate community repo Instructions on building and flashing the most up to date firmware can be found in their flashing guide