MCUXpresso doesn't see MCU-Link

[Polarix]

Hello, I have just bought a new MCU-Link probe to flash and debug a board with an RT1052 MCU.

I have connected and updated it according the instruction from your site, the process was successful, I can see "MCU-Link VCOM port" and "MCU-Link CMSIS-DAP" in the list of my devices:

But MCUXpresso can't find any probe:

I am using MCUXpresso v11.6.0 and Windows 10 Pro 22H2.

What is the reason?

Thanks in advance!

[ErichStyger · Accepted solution]

Hi @Polarix ,

which firmware version have you loaded on your probe? Keep in mind that there has been a USB driver change in sync with IDE 11.7.0 (I wrote about this on my blog here: https://mcuoneclipse.com/2023/01/25/nxp-mcuxpresso-ide-11-7-0/ ).

The thing is that the new USB driver only works with the new IDE. From your post, you are using the older 11.6.0 IDE, is there a reason for this? I recommend to use the latest and greatest (11.7.0) and then the probe is recognized. If using 11.6.0, you have to use a probe firmware matching that IDE.

I hope this helps,

Erich

[Polarix]

Thank you for your reply Erich, this was a reason, I've already mentioned it here. I'm sure there is a very important reason why the October 6 version (v.11.6.1) should not be compatible with the January 17 version (v.11.7) at the debugger firmware level.

But anyway MCU-Link can't get synchronised with my MCU, so I just give up using these terrible tools.

[lpcxpresso_supp]

The rationale behind the breaking change can be found in the blog article [1].

Regards,
MCUXpresso IDE Support

[1] https://community.nxp.com/t5/Blogs/MCU-Link-changes-to-use-WinUSB-for-MCUXpresso-IDE-11-7-and/ba-p/1...

[Polarix]

Thank you for this information

[ErichStyger]

Hi @Polarix ,

the reason is that the new McuLink firmware is using the new WinUSB driver which has been pushed by ARM. WinUSB has the advantage that it is faster, but is not compatible with previous firmware probes, as they do not know about WinUSB.

But I agree with you: it is not ideal that there is not a 'multiple-USB-endpoint' implementation for the LPC55S69 on the debug probe, because the number of possible end points are limited, and there are already USB CDC (virtual COM) endpoints in use.

I hope that makes sense,

Erich

[Polarix]

The reason is that MCUXpresso version v11.6 doesn't support the newest MCU-Link firmware (suprise!). But it doesn't help a lot, because older MCU-Link version doesn't connect to RT1052 either. This is very disappointing.

I would not recommend anyone to use NXP tools. There are many other vendors on the market with much more accessible and functional development tools.