Easily update and set XBee module settings with X-CTU

Purpose

Normally you need to purchase an additional (expensive!) piece of hardware from Digi in order to use their X-CTU application to manage your XBee modules.  You, however, would like to use your Make Controller to configure your XBee modules with X-CTU.  This allows you to update the firmware and read/write settings for your XBee modules.

The X-CTU interface

Prerequisites

First off, this how-to is Windows only since X-CTU unfortunately only runs on Windows.  For the rest of us, we need to use the OSC config options as specified in the XBee tutorial.  Uploading firmware is only available over Windows.

Addtionally you'll need a Make Controller, the X-CTU application (download here), the xctu.bin (see the bottom of this page) firmware and you'll need to have assembled the XBee board or equivalent as described in the XBee tutorial.  Also, make sure you've installed mchelper and installed the Make Controller USB drivers.

Step by step

First you need to upload the xctu.bin firmware onto your Make Controller so that it can facilitate communication between the XBee module and your computer.  Do this using mchelper and follow the guide here for info on how to upload new firmware.

Then we need to connect the XBee board & module to the Make Controller's serial port and connect the Make Controller to the computer via USB.  Then, close mchelper and open up X-CTU.

In the PC Settings tab, make sure you select Make Controller Kit from the COM ports, and then click Modem Configuration.  If you press Read, X-CTU will read the current settings on your XBee module.  You can then browse all the settings and change any of them that you like.  Once you've changed them, click Write to save those changes to the module.  After making all your changes, you'll probably want to re-upload heavy.bin to your Make Controller so you can use it as normal.

Upgrading Firmware

Upgrading the XBee module firmware is only slightly more involved.  If you haven't already, click over to the Modem Configuration tab, and click Download New Versions.  This will fetch the latest firmware versions from Digi. 

Important!  In order to upload new firmware to the board, you need to make an additional wire connection to the XBee module.  Connect a wire from the GND on the Make Controller over to the DI8 pin on the XBee Board.  Without this connection, the upload will not succeed. 

Once you've done this, select the bottommost option from the Version dropdown (10C0 at the time of this writing) and then click Write.  X-CTU will show the status of the upload - it should take about a minute or so.  Afterwards, you can click Read again to confirm that it's all updated and lovely.

The completed XBee firmware upload

That's it!  Now you can enjoy the latest and greatest features the XBee modules have to offer.

If you find you get your Make Controller into a state where it no longer uploads/reads/writes properly the best remedy is to unplug/replug the board to reset it.  With any luck this shouldn't happen too often, though.

If you want to experiment with this firmware, see the make.c and config.h files below - they're the ones I used to create the xctu.bin.  Please note that the firmware was created with Rowley CrossWorks so you might need to adjust some things to get it to work properly under GnuArm.

Further information

• MakingThings XBee tutorial
• The MakingThings XBee Board & Connector Pack
• Digi X-CTU product info page
• XBee module user manual