I had a major problem with the PCB I am working on. I was unable to program the device through the serial port. I thought I had blown the main processor, needing to re-flash it or something… Then I did some tests, and I was finding that the serial port was not working properly. Moving the angle of the connector changed it’s status. So I worked out that the problem was with the actual connector on my PC. I will put a call into DELL in the next few days.

This has actually been a problem for some time – although it has not been this bad. Mostly it has been an issue with the control lines, and not the actual data lines. It will probably be a main board replacement to get this fixed. No problem. That is what the extended service option is for… Well, that and insurance if the laptop gets stolen.

Now that I have that fixed, I am working on my code, implementing features and generally getting the product up to scratch. All in all it is looking great though – I have a deadline of about a month to have this thing 100% including a manual written and tested in the field… This will be tight but I do not see any real problems getting that done.