avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding

I was happily playing with me new arduino uno3 board until they error started to appear and I was unable to upload any more programs to the board

I spent long time searching for a solution or at least understanding what is the problem and in this blog post I will post summary of what I have learned so far

avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding error basically means the computer is unable to communicate with the board.

If this is your first try to upload something then there is a possibility you have software issues or problem with drivers.
I am not going to cover this case instead I will assume your board was working fine and suddenly stopped

Why?

• Bad usb cable
• Something is connected to pins 0,1 (serial pins)
• Micro controller chip is fried (atmega328)
• The chip responsible for communication between the board and PC is fried (ATmega16U2)
• Something else (use your imagination)

How to determine the cause?

Connect pin 0 with pin 1 on your board
Start the serial monitor window
Type anything and hit enter, did what you type appear in the output box?
If Yes, then the ATmega16U2 is working and its either the cable or the atmega328

Push the reset button, do u see the L led flashing ? If yes then the atmega328 is also fine.

Cable is cheap so u can always try another cable to verify if the cable is fine or not.

How to Fix?

You can replace the atmega328 with a new one (make sure it comes with Uno bootloader)
Like this one
You can also replace your usb cable
I am not sure if its possible to replace the ATmega16U2 IC though