Mac OS USB device disappears

[ttmetro]

My WiPy 2.0 & Expansion board work fine, except that when I disconnect the USB connection from the Mac the port will disappear and not come back when I plug in again. Rebooting the Mac brings the port back, but is tedious.

Anybody knows how to get around this?
Is there a special "shutdown" procedure?

I use Atom the access the WiPy, though I assume this is a USB / FTDI problem.

[bucknall]

Hi @ttmetro, what version of MacOS are you using?

Thanks!

Alex

[jmarcelino]

This happens on one my Macs as well, I have to make sure to close the app that is using the port before unplugging any FTDI device.

Not tracked down the problem yet but you can probably avoid the hassle by closing Atom before unplugging.

It is a USB/FTDI problem and not unique to the Py expansion board.

[bucknall]

@jmarcelino I believe this issue is related to Apple's own USB drivers, there's been historic conflicts with the last few versions of MacOS about Apple's own signed drivers... It's a real pain, to be honest!

[jmarcelino]

@bucknall
Yep I know about those and already removed the system default drivers, I'm running only the driver from FTDI there.

kextstat  | grep -i ftdi

238    0 0xffffff7f83b57000 0x7000     0x7000     com.FTDI.driver.FTDIUSBSerialDriver (2.3)

I do see there is a new FTDI driver version (I'm running 2.3, now up to 2.4.2) so will update and report back.

The Changelog looks promising!

v2.4.2	(9th March 2017)
	Surprise removal fix.

[jmarcelino]

@ttmetro
Happy to report the new driver from FTDI (2.4.2) solves the problem.

Get it from http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP.htm (direct link to DMG installer http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP/MacOSX/FTDIUSBSerialDriver_v2_4_2.dmg )

If you still have problems you may have to disable the macOS default driver, please post the result of kextstat | grep -i ftdi (with the expansion board. plugged in) here and I should be able to help you.

[ttmetro]

@jmarcelino
With the 2.4.2 driver version the problem occurs less frequently, but it still does occur. I am not sure what triggers it, perhaps using the usb port for other things and then replugging the wipy.

$ kextstat | grep -i ftdi
192 0 0xffffff7f833dd000 0x7000 0x7000 com.FTDI.driver.FTDIUSBSerialDriver (2.4.2) E16D9540-AF63-36AD-94C4-B1164FBD6078 <100 41 5 4 3 1>

macOS Sierra Version 10.12.6

[jmarcelino]

@ttmetro
That looks fine, it's using the correct driver. I guess it must now be something related to the other devices as you suggest.

Can you do a ioreg -p IOUSB to list the other devices and post the list here, maybe someone will have an idea.

[ttmetro]

@jmarcelino
$ ioreg -p IOUSB
+-o Root <class IORegistryEntry, id 0x100000100, retain 15>
+-o Root Hub Simulation Simulation@14000000 <class AppleUSBRootHubDevice, id 0x10000034b, registered, matched, active, busy 0 (0 ms), retain 10>
+-o Bluetooth USB Host Controller@14300000 <class AppleUSBDevice, id 0x1000003f2, registered, matched, active, busy 0 (1 ms), retain 21>
+-o FT230X Basic UART@14100000 <class AppleUSBDevice, id 0x1000005dd, registered, matched, active, busy 0 (15 ms), retain 14>

This is the output when the wipy is connected, and right now it's working fine.

I'll run the command again if the problem re-occurs.

Thanks,
Bernhard