Complete beginner

[hammersley1965]

Ok, I bought a education kit on ebay for my son (9786). It contained a RIS 2.0 IR transmitter and a RCX 1.0 block, a number of sensors and motors.
There was no CD and I struggled for ages.
I have now succeeded to install drivers on his Windows 7 laptop and Brickcc. When commands are sent I see the dim green light turn on and off on the IR Tower, but no reaction on the brick.
I am probably missing something really simple, but how can I know that the Tower is talking to the brick? is there something I need to do on the brick to get it to receive messages from the tower?
Once I can get the two talking, one would assume that I will need to update the RCX firmware (I think the kit sat in a storeroom for years) tips on doing this would be helpful.

Thank you in advance for your help

[mattallen37]

First, please confirm which IR Tower. USB, or the RS-232 serial (requires 9v battery)?
Based on the circumstances (there is no support on Win7 for the USB tower), I'll assume serial.
The light shouldn't be dim. Replace the battery.
The RCX almost definitely doesn't have FW on it. Anytime you take out the batteries for more than about a minute, you loose all data, including the firmware.
The RCX must have FW to be able to do anything useful. It doesn't even respond to the remote without the FW on it.
After you replace the battery (or confirm it is good), try downloading the firmware to the RCX.

[hammersley1965]

Hi Matt, thanks for the quick response
The IR Tower is USB, even under windows7 Brickcc recognises the IR Tower, maybe I got lucky.
The green light seems dim, but I don't see that as the issue having seen a vid of one working and looking the same.
I'm sure to the more experienced this is going to seem a stupid question, but here goes:
If my brick has no firmware (very likely) and it needs firmware to communicate with the IR Tower, how do I install the firmware? It seems that the only way to communicate with the brick is via the IR Tower - Catch 22?
I am obviously missing something, I used to program all sorts of stuff, worked at Sony doing R&D for 2 years, maybe it is early onset of senility, but I would really appreciate having the obvious pointed out to me

[mattallen37]

Well, if it looks like it is working with Win7, that could be your problem. There is no driver for the IR Tower that works on Win7 (unless maybe it's a 32 bit system, then possibly). I have looked for a long time for the drivers, so I REALLY doubt you have it configured properly.

Since it is the USB tower, the brightness of the green LED is of no significance (that I am aware of).

To see if it has lego FW, what does it display when you turn it on? does it display "0000 (man) 1"? or "(nothing......)(man) 1"? If it shows the four 0's, it has FW.

You can download the FW without "connecting" to the brick, since you can't anyhow when it doesn't have FW. In BCC, go to Tools -> Download Firmware, and browse for the FW file.

BTW, do you have the FW file? I think it might be included with BCC, but i'm not sure. If not, it should be on the web, or I could post it. You want 2.0 FW (more features than 1.0).

[mightor]

Try this driver: http://www.robotc.net/files/rcxdriver.zip, it may work under Windows 7. For 32 bit OSes, though.

- Xander

[hammersley1965]

when the brick is turned on it makes a double beep and the display shows a battery symbol, a man standing still and a 1. When the run button is pressed the man changes to a walk position. the prgm button scrols through 1-5, I assume that is 5 program functions. The view button does nothing. So I assume it has no firmware loaded.
On the PC I have installed:
bricxcc_setup_3388
LEGOMindstormsSDK25
RIS20XPPatch3
tower164

I am about to try rcxDriver.

I'll see if it makes a difference.

BTW Matt, if you are in michigan, what are you doing up in the middle of the night?

[mightor]

BTW Matt, if you are in michigan, what are you doing up in the middle of the night?

Matt is actually a really clever Python script which John Hansen and I put together last October at Lego World in the Netherlands. It's running on an old Pentium II I have under my desk. Pretty cool, huh?

- Xander

[mattallen37]

No, your RCX doesn't have FW.

I just realized, that since your green light did come on, your tower probably IS configured properly. If you go to "Devices and Printers", and double click on the tower, click on the "Hardware" tab, and at the bottom it should say "Device status"; what does it say as the status? mine says "The drivers for this device are not installed. (Code 28)". If yours really IS installed properly, I would love to get a copy of your driver.

I am in Michigan, and my schedule is such that I get up mid-afternoon, and go to bed at 6-8am. It is much quieter around the house this time of day, and it is easier to concentrate on stuff.

@Xander ROTFLOL! That is pretty good. I wish I was at your apartment (even if I did have to live in a computer) You have the most awesome toys in the world!

[hammersley1965]

Yippee!

I reinstalled the SDk and found the firmware file and used Brickcc to download.

However, once it was downloaded the brick started beeping. I turned off and on. The display showed 0000 man 1 but after a few seconds the beeping started again. Ah, I thought, maybe the batteries are low. I dug out 6 fairly well charged batteries and replaced. As warned the firmware was lost, so i downloaded it again, but again it started beeping. When it beeps the screen only shows a battery symbol, without my glasses (lost them again - told you I was senile) it lookes like a x in the middle of the battery.

What does continuous beeping mean? If it is battery low, does this mean that the RCX brick cannot be run on rechargables?

[mattallen37]

I am glad you got it working. Can you please direct me to the driver, or post it for me? I have been wanting to use my USB towers with Win7 for a LONG time.

It means the batteries are low (beeping means really low).