Is ESP Firmware is replaced when download code from Arduino?

[wpkeenan]

Hi, I am trying to develop a ESPnow mesh network and have come up against an obstacle. It seems my ESP8266 devices cannot hear broadcast messages when i send to MAC FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF. The ESP32 device can hear these messages, but not the 8266 devices. There is conflicting info on the net about whether this is normal or not. I am coming up with stuff about newer versions of NonOS SDK. I have come to understand that this is probably the installed firmware on the ESP8266 when I purchased it. Is this correct? If so is this firmware replaced by a download of my code from Arduino IDE or does my code run under this firmware? My ESP8266 firmware is 2015, V1.5.4, purchased in 2021 from aliexpress. If this firmware is used to run my arduino code then I maybe should upgrade it, although that seems non-trivial. If it is replaced by the Arduino code then upgrading the NonOS firmware would be a waste of time.
Any help would be much appreciated.
Regards
Bill

 

[KlausST]

Hi,

what is your understanding of "ESP Firmware?

* There is a bootloader
* and there is the application firmware.

By uploading your firmware the exisiting application firmware becomes overwritten.
The bootloader will still exist.

No one of us can tell whether you bought these devices including bootloader and/or some specific firmware.

Klaus

 

[wpkeenan]

Hi Klaus,
Thanks for the reply. My understanding of ESP devices is limited. These devices have V1.5.4 firmware and 1.1.0 AT firmware. Using AT+GMR reveals version numbers of Boot and AT firmware. I have done further investigation and I believe the 1.5.4 firmware is the NonOS SDK, (the boot loader) and downloading my Arduino code overwrites the AT 1.1.0 firmware, (the application code that you speak of) at which point I can no longer see any version info. I tried to install SDK 2.2.1 without success and then installed SDK 3.0.5 semi-successfully, but the AT part of it didn't work so I could not see the version of the SDK from a terminal. I then downloaded the Arduino code and it runs, but unfortunately it didn't fix my original broadcast problem. They are 1Mb devices.

 

[tepalia02]

No, the bootloader is never erased.