🚨 ERROR: cannot communicate with the Proxmark (on Mac OS)

Support
6

Hey man. Brew is not the way. I had more issues trying to update brew than just downloading fresh from Git. This is my own install process and it is copied very directly from Amal’s Getting Started Guide and the official OSX Guide from RFIDResearchGroup

  1. Lets install the dependencies first. In terminal run the following commands:
    brew Install Git
    brew install readline qt5 gd pkgconfig coreutils
    brew install recode
    brew install astyle
  2. Create yourself a Github Folder. I have mine in ~/github/
  3. In your folder run
    git clone https://github.com/RfidResearchGroup/proxmark3.git
  4. cd proxmark3
  5. cp Makefile.platform.sample Makefile.platform
  6. nano Makefile.platform
  7. Notice the lines;
PLATFORM=PM3RDV4
#PLATFORM=PM3GENERIC

You will want to swap the # to the top line to comment it out and remove it from the bottom line to enable.

#PLATFORM=PM3RDV4
PLATFORM=PM3GENERIC
  1. Command+X, Y, Enter to save and close Nano
  2. make clean && make -j8 all

The button Trick

With your Proxmark3 unplugged from your machine, press and hold the button on your Proxmark3 as you plug it into a USB port. You can release the button, two of the four LEDs should stay on. You’re in bootloader mode, ready for the next step. In case the two LEDs don’t stay on when you’re releasing the button, you’ve an old bootloader, start over and keep the button pressed during the whole flashing procedure.

  1. ./pm3-flash-bootrom
  2. ./pm3-flash-fullimage
  3. Run pm3
  4. Run hw tune

If these steps dont work or you see error messages along the way, screenshot and post and ill try to help you out.

3 Likes