need help. mm is killing me
 

i just bought my mm from ebay guy said it was only used once i get it and it looks kinda beat up so i hook it up and manually beeped programmed it (yeah that sucks, no usb go figure), and presto my slash was flying on some intellect 4200 and a 7700 motor so i put it away find my wife usb for her digital cam. install cc link on vista 32 and i plug in the controller two green squares so were good i tried changing some setting hit update and halfway thru my screen stop and says it doesn't recognize usb device and needs a driver and cuts the link to the Esc. now i unplugged everything and throw a pack in it and nothing just the red led stays on and dim very dim and thats it nothing. steering is fine but no throttle no beeps nothing not a sound and after plugging it in and unplugging like 100 times the computer wont even recognize it anymore and now i have a really nice,expensive and steerable paper weight.
has this happened to any one else, what it feels like is that the firmware from the esc has been deleted and now its ____???? so what can i do.
i'm not new to castle but this one is kicking my a$$
anything any idea ill listen. i wanna see if there's something i can do before i try to blow a gasket on the guy that sold i to me and get my money back.
please help i would really appreciate it guys i've read these forums for a while now and you all sound like a family talking so i wanna join.
thanks in advance

ohh yeah... i hate punctuation.

Ok first of all, did you buy this ESC from rcbonezzz or rcwaffle? I saw today that he's put up a few MMs for sale, thats why I ask. Secondly, run a firmware update from Castle Link and see what happens. Also, I'm not sure if there are any Vista specific issues as I'm a linux user but read the Castle Link specific threads. And I hope you did disconnect the battery from the ESC before hooking it up to the ESC.

From what I understand, Castle link doesn't work with the MM and Windows Vista.

http://www.rc-monster.com/forum/showthread.php?t=14548

Before you "blow a gasket" on the guy, try a different computer running a different OS.

I use my laptop for programming the mm under windows xp.

Windows Vista is on my desktop computer and works for the Monster Mamba but NOT the MM.

Or if you know computers, run a virtual XP machine inside vista. from what I hear VMware is good.

Or Dual boot your computer

Mine works fine with the MM and vista.But I had to do it how that thread says to,compatible with xp.

"I just bought my mm from ebay guy said it was only used once i get it and it looks kinda beat up so"

This is why I stopped buying used stuff from ebay. I only buy new now if it is a better price than what I can get at an internet store. Usually thats not the case though. The pennies you save are not worth it.

i got the castle link going on my computer, the problem goes when i try to update and i plug in the mm the and update it says it needs a driver. and now the truck wont run it just sits there when i turn it on it just lights the red led very dim.
maybe im using the wrong usb maybe?
yes you right hemi for electronics im not going to ebay anymore EVER.
im running c link in xp compatibility mode

oh and yes i plugged the the usb with the battery once, could that fry it, do i get a check ready to CC.

http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/j...r/103_3744.jpg

see this is what the esc does when i plug in a pack and turn it on.

ive tried 4 computers same result it progressively got worse till now nothing works

You may have cooked the internal bec... Not sure if that can happen when running the usb cable with the battery plugged into the esc. The usb provides 5v to the esc brain for programming. You could try powering the esc with a rx pack, not sure if that will work.

The BEC is not operational AFAIK while on USB. Power is taken from the USB port regardless, hence why CC states to disconnect batteries before connecting the a Castle Link adapter to any ESC. VMWare has is progressively becoming more and more bloated, I remember when the download was just 50MB. I use VirtualBox from Sun on my Ubuntu powered laptop and it works fine on both my MM and MMM. There's a windows build too, all the downloads are here http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads

so does the red light mean i cooked the esc in general or what should be my next step what you see there is all the esc does when i have a pack hooked up.

:no:

Just thinking out loud here: reading posts in L33t, with bad grammar, no punctuation, etc., may put off a lot of people from reading your posts because is is very mind numbing. Proper use of language makes the support process in these forums efficient and enjoyable. Please put some effort into this and you will find that dividends are many.

That being said, give Castle Creations a call and talk to their tech support and tell them what happened. Depending on how old the unit actually is, I don't see you paying for the repair regardless of who the original buyer was (anything over a year old is out of warranty).