# SONOFF MicroPython Wonderland

May 22nd 2018
ESP8266/ESP32/Automation

Over the weekend I flashed off the default firmware on a cheap Sonoff basic Internet connected relay. Along the way I ran into a few issues, but eventually got MicroPython running on it.

My father bought a bunch of SONOFF Basic modules and started installing them around his house. While I like the idea of them, I don’t like the idea of connecting them to some network off in Shenzhen, China. That has backdoor written all over it. Call me paranoid but any company operating inside China has a very real risk of being co-opted by their government. Opening it up you find that it is powered by an esp8266 and the serial connection is conveniently broken out for us.

Soldering a little female header on there was quick and easy and then I had access to serial connection and GPIO14 which is free.

### The GPIO

The button pin is GPIO 00. This is perfect because it lets us boot the esp into bootloader mode. The relay is connected to GPIO 13, and the LED is connected to GPIO 12

Folks, I’m going to tell you right now, mistakes were made. It took me FOREVER to figure out why my FTDI basic just wasn’t connecting to this thing. I broke out the multimeter, I made sure my voltages were correct, I reinstalled it to the outlet to see if it still powered on. swapped Tx and Rx. Nothing!… All I have to say now is, make sure you are connecting ground to ground and not “DTR GRN” to ground. GRN looks a lot like GND at first glance. I did however ensure my FTDI was in 3.3V mode. Make sure you do too!

###### CC BY 2.0 made available by Sparkfun Electronics.

Once that was sorted it was time to do a quick `flash_erase` and a `flash_write` of the new Micropython build for the 8266. Things should be smooth sailing from here. Let’s just do a quick `erase_flash`

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    esptool.py -p /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 erase_flash
    esptool.py v2.3.1
    Connecting....
    Detecting chip type... ESP8266
    Chip is ESP8266EX
    Features: WiFi
    Uploading stub...
    Running stub...
    Stub running...
    Erasing flash (this may take a while)...
    Chip erase completed successfully in 2.9s
    Hard resetting via RTS pin...

Perfect, and now we flash with `esptool.py -p /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 write_flash 0x0 esp8266-20180511-v1.9.4.bin`

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    esptool.py v2.3.1
    Connecting....
    Detecting chip type... ESP8266
    Chip is ESP8266EX
    Features: WiFi
    Uploading stub...
    Running stub...
    Stub running...
    Configuring flash size...
    Auto-detected Flash size: 1MB
    Flash params set to 0x0020
    Compressed 604872 bytes to 394893...
    Wrote 604872 bytes (394893 compressed) at 0x00000000 in 35.0 seconds (effective 138.3 kbit/s)...
    Hash of data verified.

    Leaving...
    Hard resetting via RTS pin...

Alright looks good and now lets screen into the serial port with `screen /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 115200` and jump right into REPL

Well shoot… Ok let’s try another erase/flash cycle and then run a `flash_verify` for good measure.

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    esptool.py -p /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 verify_flash 0x0 esp8266-20180511-v1.9.4.bin
    esptool.py v2.3.1
    Connecting....
    Detecting chip type... ESP8266
    Chip is ESP8266EX
    Features: WiFi
    Uploading stub...
    Running stub...
    Stub running...
    Configuring flash size...
    Auto-detected Flash size: 1MB
    Flash params set to 0x0020
    Verifying 0x93ac8 (604872) bytes @ 0x00000000 in flash against esp8266-20180511-v1.9.4.bin...
    -- verify OK (digest matched)
    Hard resetting via RTS pin...

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    screen /dev/tty.usbderial-AD025KY2 115200

## Failure.

I tried this time and time again on my windows box, swapped over to my more familiar OSX laptop and did it again, tried older pre-compiled bins from micropython. Nothing was getting me anywhere.

Off to the googler (well, the duck, duck, go-er) to figure out what the issue is here. Most of what I find is people flashing Micropython on the SONOFF with no problems. Technically, I did it with no problem according to the flash verification. What I’m specifically looking for is “SONOFF Micropython no REPL”. That lead me to this solution.

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    esptool.py -p /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 flash_id
    esptool.py v2.3.1
    Connecting....
    Detecting chip type... ESP8266
    Chip is ESP8266EX
    Features: WiFi
    Uploading stub...
    Running stub...
    Stub running...
    Manufacturer: 5e
    Device: 4014
    Detected flash size: 1MB
    Hard resetting via RTS pin...

Looking at what it spits out i can see “Manufacturer: 5e” which is exactly the problem they were talking about on the micropython forum. The suggested solution is flashing with `-fs 1MB` and `-fm dout`

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    esptool.py -p /dev/tty.usbserial-AD025KY2 write_flash -fs 1MB -fm dout 0x0 esp8266-20180511-v1.9.4.bin
    esptool.py v2.3.1
    Connecting....
    Detecting chip type... ESP8266
    Chip is ESP8266EX
    Features: WiFi
    Uploading stub...
    Running stub...
    Stub running...
    Configuring flash size...
    Flash params set to 0x0320
    Compressed 604872 bytes to 394893...
    Wrote 604872 bytes (394893 compressed) at 0x00000000 in 35.0 seconds (effective 138.1 kbit/s)...
    Hash of data verified.

    Leaving...
    Hard resetting via RTS pin...

##### Props go to pythoncoder for what I’m sure was a a very frustrating time figuring this out.

He’s also posted a fairly detailed write up on why you shouldn’t waste your time with the SONOFF modules as they seem to all be unreliable both in runtime and connectivity. I won’t let that discourage me as I’m not using it for anything mission critical or non accessible right now.

### Back on track

Let’s take a look at what we have to work with here. Jump into a REPL via screen and let’s play.

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    from machine import Pin

    button = Pin(0, Pin.IN, Pin.PULL_UP)
    led = Pin(13, Pin.OUT)
    relay = Pin(12, Pin.OUT)

    led.value(0) #turns LED "On"... seems inverted
    relay.value(1) #Hey the relay makes a sound!
    print(button.value()) #1
    #Press the button
    print(button.value()) #0

nifty… Here’s the overview

GPIO | Use | Status
--- | --- | ---
GPIO 00 | Pushbutton, bootloader mode | In use
GPIO 01 | TX Pin | Available with care
GPIO 03 | RX Pin | Available with care
GPIO 04 | NC on esp8266 chip | Can be used with a little finesse.
GPIO 05 | “” | “”
GPIO 12 | Relay | In use
GPIO 13 | LED | In use
GPIO 14 | Broken out | Free for use

##### We’ll talk about pin 4 and 5 at a later date.

## BONUS ROUND

Hey! Look at that there LED. It’s got itself 3 legs! That usually means that it’s got 2 or more colors. Now judging by the way setting pin 13 to low causes the led to turn on, I’m going to assume that this is what’s known as a common anode LED. This means that the centre pin is always 3.3v and when you ground one of the other two, it turns that emitter on. Grounding the right pin turns the LED red. Let’s attach that to GPIO14 for now as we don’t have current plans for it.

That’s it for this round. Stay tuned for part 2 of the SONOFF saga. If you have any questions or corrections, feel free to leave a comment below!

John Warren

Just a place to make stuff