Can the nRF 52840-DK be used for ble testing?

I've not had much luck with the dongle or nRF52DK with the 9.2.0 SDK flashed with the latest hex file.  Pre 9.2.0 and the older hex files have been working for me for years.  Make sure you try with that.

I just checked and the dongle is less that $15us from a few vendors

Thanks, I am trying to get 9.1 to work but I get a error: ```
VM Region Info: 0 is not in any region. Bytes before following region: 4301373440
REGION TYPE START - END [ VSIZE] PRT/MAX SHRMOD REGION DETAIL
UNUSED SPACE AT START
--->
__TEXT 10061c000-10173c000 [ 17.1M] r-x/r-x SM=COW /Users/USER/Library/Application Support/Garmin/*/ConnectIQ.app/Contents/MacOS/simulator```

Do you have an idea what this is? Otherwise I will indeed buy the dongle. 

What hex file did you flash it with?

If it was me, I'd just spend a few bucks for the dongle instead to spending a bunch of time trying to get your board to work.

By the way I have a simple app where you can check if the Garmin can see the BLE device you want to use.  

BLEScan: BleScan | Connect IQ Store

so I have the dongle, flashed it restarted my whole Mac plugged it out and in started the sim and put first a wrong com port and than the right one. I still get the wrong com port error. when I go to nrf connect and I select the usb.hex file I can only write it and I dont see that my file is written to the usb because the usb view das not change any ideas what to do next.

when I am in the sim the nrf connect app is closed and no leds on the usb

There is a different hex file for the 9.2.0 SDK and the earlier SDKS.  I've not had much luck with the 9.2.0 SDK and newer hex files.  I can't even get the SDK nordic thingy52 samples to work with 9.2.0 (I do have a Thingy 52).

What exactly are you trying?

https://developer.garmin.com/connect-iq/core-topics/bluetooth-low-energy/

There is a section on finding the correct comm port on a mac.  I'm on windows so I can't help with that.

On Windows, after I flash the hex file to the dongle, a led is on, but then I unplug the dongle and plug it back in, and no led and the comm port may change but it works.

• Firmware for the nRF52 DK

  The memory layout of the nRF52 DK will need to be flashed to a different firmware for use with the Connect IQ SDK. The correct firmware for the development environment has been provided:

  • nRF52 DK firmware

  • nRF52840 Dongle firmware

  Note: For SDKs prior to 9.2.0, use:

  • nRF52 DK firmware (old)

  • nRF52840 Dongle firmware (old)

It works now,

after doing the whole process again and again I now getdata and it look like it is going stuff. It is on the new sdk. 

Uhm about the thingy52 these hex files are really specific and do not have anything on the first address in ram so chances are it will never work there because it das not know where to start in the program as far is I know and understand. These hex files are okey but some real program files would have been way more helpful.

Not sure what you mean.  The hex files are to allow the sim to work and are not specific to a CIQ app..

In doing some more testing with 9.2.0 and the new hex files, I've got things to kind-of work where I can see the scan results, pair, and get data.  Before, I could see the scan result but not pair or read a characteristic,  This all worked very well with pre 9.2.0 and the old hex files.  The sensors I'm testing with are raspberry pi based.  See  Would you like some Raspberry Pi with your Connect IQ? 

jim_m_58 said:

In doing some more testing with 9.2.0 and the new hex files, I've got things to kind-of work where I can see the scan results, pair, and get data

How did you manage to make it work with 9.2? I am having same issue (can't pair, already paired device error) in the simulator but all works fine in physical devices with datafields built with 9.2

not sure what changed but it may be using the newest device files or maybe newer windows driver files for the hw.