I'm a total newbie to electronics and programming. The $50 robot was my first project, and, barring some soldering disasters it worked... fantastic. So I've gone back to bottom of the learning curve to try to figure out why and why it works.
However, I now seem totally unable to reprogram the chip. I've followed various tutorials, but the chip seems frozen with the $50 Robot software.
I'm using AVR Studio and the AVRISP Mk2 with the firmware upgrade. The programming comments tell me that the erase, writing, verification etc. is all OK. The AVRISP LEDs do everything they should, but as far as I can tell there is no change to the loaded program. Even the most basic instructions to set pins high do nothing. Using a LED to check the pins PD0 and PD1 flicker and PD4 is on, as I guess you would expect, and stay there in spite of reprogramming.
Assuming I'd done something to screw up the chip, (eg shorts, fuses etc.) I got a new one rebuilt the wiring and loaded a new program, and now that appears to be loaded with the $50 Robot code.
I've tried searching this site, AVRFREAKS and others and I cant find anything similar. I've run out of ideas.
I would really appreciate some advice here.
Thanks
Typo
