How to Burn a Boot loader on an Ender 5 and upgrade Firmware

*FYI: This may still be a jumbled up mess, I am working on the editing of this post and writing as I do my own burn/upgrade. Bear with me please.

If you are a tech savvy person like myself, the first thing you are wondering when you get your Ender 5; is what can I do to make this thing better, and safer. Most technical persons first move would be to verify that the firmware is up-to-date and the safety mechanisms are in place. Bad news is that all Ender 5’s I have come across do NOT have thermal shutdown implemented.

Just like burning a boot loader to the other boards, you will need to pick up an Arduino; preferably the Uno model for it’s ease of use and cheap price tag. In addition to the Uno you will need 5 Female to Female Dupont connectors, and a single Male to Female Dupont connector. Connect the ISP headers together, and the last bottom right pin on the Creality board (when the control panel is facing the front) will go to Pin 10 on the arduino. It’s best to buy a whole dupont connector kit from eBay or Amazon, as you get extra for later for only several dollars.

Now, it’s time to download or open the Arduino IDE. You can download that here. Once you are setup, and the Arduino IDE is opened it’s time to prepare the IDE. First, you will go to the File menu, and find Preferences. You will see near the bottom of the Preferences page a section that says “Additional Board Manager URLs” which is a section to expand the type of hardware that can be used in the Arduino software. The URL you will type is below, and if you already have something in this box simply add a comma, and then paste this right after it.

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Lauszus/Sanguino/master/package_lauszus_sanguino_index.json

Before we attach the Arduino to the Creality board, let’s prepare our Arduino Uno as a programmer.

1. Open the Arudino IDE that you just downloaded
2. From the Tools menu, select Board and then chose your board type (Arduino/Genuino UNO in my case)
3. From the Tools menu, select the port your Arduino is connected to (COM5 in my case)
4. From the File menu, select Examples > ArudinoISP > ArudinoISP
5. Select Upload (Sketch > Upload or the small right facing arrow on the toolbar)

Once that uploads successfully, your Arduino is now a Programmer! Disconnect it from your PC and close the Arduino IDE. Earlier you copied into your board URLs the Sanguino github. Now travel to the Tools menu, click on Boards and find the Board Manager button. A new menu will open up, let it load and once finished you will click on the top search bar and type “Sanguino” which is the board we added to the preferences several moments ago. Click on the Install button, and wait for this to finish.

Once you have the needed materials, you should lean your Ender 5 backwards and perch it against a wall or something sturdy. Then you will remove the 4 screws from the bottom plate, which will fall off so be careful. You will need to unplug the board fan, it’s a set of red and white wires which will be attached to the fan on the cover. The plug will simply pull away from the Creality board, and you set the cover to the side.

Once the cover is out of the way, orient the Arduino so that the ISP text is in the same orientation as the Creality board. Then you will connect each dupont to the pin that mirrors the pin on your arduino, or you can use the above layout to connect them. The RESET pin on the Creality will need to connect to digital pin 10 on your Arduino board. Then you will hook the Arduino into your PC, and make sure that your printer’s control panel lights up, if it doesn’t you are probably not hooked up correctly.

Now it’s time to burn the bootloader. Let’s begin with the steps below, and verify your tool’s menu looks the same as ours other than the PORT section.

1. Pick the “Sanguino” Board from the list of Boards under Tools > Boards.
2. Make sure the Processor is set to ATMega1284 or 1284p (16mhz) under Tools > Processor.
3. Pick the correct COM port for your Arduino board.
4. Set the Programmer to Arduino as ISP
5. Now it’s time to hit Burn Bootloader.

Now you should have a message below that says “Bootloader burn complete” and you have now successfully installed a bootloader. Now it’s time to upgrade your firmware!

Instructions for the firmware upload coming soon, download our Ender 5 ready firmware below!