Can't program sparkfun breakout

[nrbrook]

I purchased a sparkfun breakout board (https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/nrf52832-breakout-board-hookup-guide and schematic https://cdn.sparkfun.com/assets/learn_tutorials/5/4/9/sparkfun-nrf52832-breakout-schematic-v10.pdf).

I tried to hook up to my nRF52 DK for external programming as detailed in the first link (plus connecting breakout 3v3 to DK VDD for power). The power and user LEDs light up on the sparkfun. Using segger embedded studio, it seems that the download to the breakout is successful. I don't then get any RTT output, and don't see any BLE advertisements, and I can't modify the user LED state, so it seems that the program doesn't run.

I also soldered a pin header to the cortex debug connector on the breakout, and connected to the debug out on the DK, plus connecting DK VDD to breakout 3v3 again. This was exactly the same.

Am I doing something wrong? Thanks

[hmolesworth]

Maybe you have an issue with Gnd Detect, which is different from Gnd. If your Sparkfun breakout is only connected to Gnd Detect (which is a there is a board connected sense line) with no separate connection to the nRF52 DK Gnd then the board cannot be programmed as it is never detected. I expect Sparkfun had a separate Gnd connection via power supplies or something which they don't mention.

Fix in this scenario is to just connect together the two board Gnds - and keep the Gnd Dtect connection as well.

[nrbrook]

Thanks, but the cortext connector does connect ground I think. It appears the firmware download is successful anyway, which is what is so strange (and it's not going to the nrf52832 on the DK). I'll connect ground externally anyway to make sure.