[avr-chat] "double check connections"

[Marge Coahran]

I am using several STK500s with ATmega8515L chips to teach assembly 
language in a computer science course. Today two students got the 
error (below) from avrdude. As best I can tell, the serial port 
connections are correct and solid. Can this error also mean something more 
ominous, say that something on the chip or the board just got blown?

For background, we were also plugging a speaker into the expandion header 
on the STK500. I'm pretty sure this was the problem for one student, who 
wired the speaker between CT1 and GND -- and the AVR socket is now 
corroded! However, another student with the same error message wired his 
speaker between PB0 and GND, which I believe should be fine (and works 
correctly for me and others).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
quine$ make program
/usr/local/bin/avrdude -y \
        -C /usr/local/etc/avrdude.conf \
        -p m8515 \
        -c stk500v2 \
        -P /dev/ttyS0 \
        -U flash:w:speaker.hex

avrdude: stk500v2_command(): command failed
avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1
         Double check connections and try again, or use -F to override
         this check.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks!
Marge