Hello!

Finally, I have received this USB programmer... I wired everything up, but flashing the Sensebender Micros does not work, sadly. According to avrdude they do not seem to respond:

avrdude: warning: cannot set sck period. please check for usbasp firmware update.
avrdude: error: program enable: target doesn't answer. 1 
avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1
         Double check connections and try again, or use -F to override
         this check.

Error while burning bootloader.

I managed to program and burn the bootloader of a normal Arduino Pro Mini using this programmer and the same cable, so the programmer is working as expected.

Thanks for your responses. Sadly, both of my devices are not in factory state anymore. Nevertheless, I will report back after I have received this USBISP programmer.

@xmonika

Thanks, I just ordered the same programmer. Let's see if this is working. How did you wire the programmer to the Sensebender? Just asking because the programmer has more pins available than the Arduino board.

Okay, I have soldered the second Sensebender too and tried to burn the bootloader via Arduino IDE onto both devices. The verbose log was the following:

/home/x/.arduino15/packages/arduino/tools/avrdude/6.3.0-arduino9/bin/avrdude -C/home/x/.arduino15/packages/arduino/tools/avrdude/6.3.0-arduino9/etc/avrdude.conf -v -patmega328p -cstk500v2 -Pusb -Uflash:w:/home/x/.arduino15/packages/MySensors/hardware/avr/1.0.1/bootloaders/DualOptiboot/optiboot_atmega328_pro_8MHz.hex:i -Ulock:w:0x0F:m 

avrdude: Version 6.3, compiled on Jan 17 2017 at 11:00:16
         Copyright (c) 2000-2005 Brian Dean, http://www.bdmicro.com/
         Copyright (c) 2007-2014 Joerg Wunsch

         System wide configuration file is "/home/x/.arduino15/packages/arduino/tools/avrdude/6.3.0-arduino9/etc/avrdude.conf"
         User configuration file is "/home/x/.avrduderc"
         User configuration file does not exist or is not a regular file, skipping

         Using Port                    : usb
         Using Programmer              : stk500v2
avrdude: usbdev_open(): Found AVRISP mkII, serno: redacted
         AVR Part                      : ATmega328P
         Chip Erase delay              : 9000 us
         PAGEL                         : PD7
         BS2                           : PC2
         RESET disposition             : dedicated
         RETRY pulse                   : SCK
         serial program mode           : yes
         parallel program mode         : yes
         Timeout                       : 200
         StabDelay                     : 100
         CmdexeDelay                   : 25
         SyncLoops                     : 32
         ByteDelay                     : 0
         PollIndex                     : 3
         PollValue                     : 0x53
         Memory Detail                 :

                                  Block Poll               Page                       Polled
           Memory Type Mode Delay Size  Indx Paged  Size   Size #Pages MinW  MaxW   ReadBack
           ----------- ---- ----- ----- ---- ------ ------ ---- ------ ----- ----- ---------
           eeprom        65    20     4    0 no       1024    4      0  3600  3600 0xff 0xff
           flash         65     6   128    0 yes     32768  128    256  4500  4500 0xff 0xff
           lfuse          0     0     0    0 no          1    0      0  4500  4500 0x00 0x00
           hfuse          0     0     0    0 no          1    0      0  4500  4500 0x00 0x00
           efuse          0     0     0    0 no          1    0      0  4500  4500 0x00 0x00
           lock           0     0     0    0 no          1    0      0  4500  4500 0x00 0x00
           calibration    0     0     0    0 no          1    0      0     0     0 0x00 0x00
           signature      0     0     0    0 no          3    0      0     0     0 0x00 0x00

         Programmer Type : STK500V2
         Description     : Atmel STK500 Version 2.x firmware
         Programmer Model: AVRISP mkII
         Hardware Version: 1
         Firmware Version Master : 1.23
         Vtarget         : 3.0 V
         SCK period      : 8.00 us

avrdude: AVR device initialized and ready to accept instructions

Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.00s

avrdude: Device signature = 0x1e950f (probably m328p)
avrdude: NOTE: "flash" memory has been specified, an erase cycle will be performed
         To disable this feature, specify the -D option.
avrdude: erasing chip
avrdude: reading input file "/home/x/.arduino15/packages/MySensors/hardware/avr/1.0.1/bootloaders/DualOptiboot/optiboot_atmega328_pro_8MHz.hex"
avrdude: writing flash (32768 bytes):

Writing | ################################################## | 100% 0.00s

avrdude: 32768 bytes of flash written
avrdude: verifying flash memory against /home/x/.arduino15/packages/MySensors/hardware/avr/1.0.1/bootloaders/DualOptiboot/optiboot_atmega328_pro_8MHz.hex:
avrdude: load data flash data from input file /home/x/.arduino15/packages/MySensors/hardware/avr/1.0.1/bootloaders/DualOptiboot/optiboot_atmega328_pro_8MHz.hex:
avrdude: input file /home/x/.arduino15/packages/MySensors/hardware/avr/1.0.1/bootloaders/DualOptiboot/optiboot_atmega328_pro_8MHz.hex contains 32768 bytes
avrdude: reading on-chip flash data:

Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.00s

avrdude: verifying ...
avrdude: 32768 bytes of flash verified
avrdude: reading input file "0x0F"
avrdude: writing lock (1 bytes):

Writing | ################################################## | 100% 0.01s

avrdude: 1 bytes of lock written
avrdude: verifying lock memory against 0x0F:
avrdude: load data lock data from input file 0x0F:
avrdude: input file 0x0F contains 1 bytes
avrdude: reading on-chip lock data:

Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.00s

avrdude: verifying ...
avrdude: WARNING: invalid value for unused bits in fuse "lock", should be set to 1 according to datasheet
This behaviour is deprecated and will result in an error in future version
You probably want to use 0xcf instead of 0x0f (double check with your datasheet first).
avrdude: 1 bytes of lock verified

avrdude done.  Thank you.

Interesting in this log is the warning about the invalid value for some fuse bits...

Flashing a sketch after re-burning the bootloader sadly did not work, the same not in sync error occured again. Next, I tried to burn the bootloader using the board setting of the Arduino Pro Mini (3.3v, 8mhz). Strange enough, this does not work anymore now, yielding a pretty generic error:

avrdude: stk500v2_command(): command failed
avrdude: stk500v2_program_enable(): bad AVRISPmkII connection status: Unknown status 0x00
avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1
         Double check connections and try again, or use -F to override
         this check.

I do not know, I can only assume that maybe burning another bootloader does not work because of the invalid value warning while burning the default bootloader. I also tried to burn the original Optiboot without success.

Thank you for you input. I had luck and we have an AVRISP mk2 lying around in my company that I can borrow for the weekend. So my plan would be to try to re-flash DualOptiboot first or another bootloader (maybe the stock Arduino Pro Mini one) in further tries and see if this helps.

The only two things I am trying to figure out in this very moment are:

1. in which direction the ISP cable has to be mounted so that nothing is damaged
2. and I do not know yet for sure if the AVRISP mk2 is actually suppyling power or not to the board (for cases where e.g. it may feed 5 volts).

Hello!

I was hoping I would find a solution here as I basically have the same problem. I ordered two Sensebender Micros like two months ago and flashing a sketch onto them is failing with the same avrdude: stk500_getsync() attempt X of Y: not in sync error. (Noteworthy: I only assembled one Sensebender so far, I haven't tried the second one).

In my case: I am using ArchLinux with kernel 4.13, so drivers should not be the issue here. I am using this FTDI flash module and the same USB cable for other projects and was able to successfully flash an ESP 8266, a Arduino Pro Mini and a Nano.

Executing the self-test on the Sensebender Micro does also work and with serial attached I even get the output that all tests have passed. Still, i am not able to flash something onto this device using the IDE. Instead of selecting the board option Sensebender Micro (using both 8 and 1 MHz options) I even tried some odd choices like Arduino Pro Mini or Arduino Nano. Nevertheless, none of those did work.

Regarding FTDI to Sensebender connection: VCC <-> VCC, GND <-> GND, RX and TX are swapped. I even tried replacing the cables and tried to connect DTR without luck.

Any further hints are appreciated, thank you.