They are currently shipped with V1.4 which is the latest official version. I'm not aware of a V1.5 and if it exists then my guess is it's an unofficial version or beta.Out of interest, along the way of looking for any clues, I found mention of the firmware being "v 1.5", rather than the now old originals (up to v1,4). I see that you report that there is updated FW on these, would that be simular things?
Although there are no header pins fitted to jumper J3 it is still functional. Shorting the pads together will slow down the clock rateis that why there is no jumper for that installed ?
Not really unless you have a compelling reason to use the USBisp over the asp.Would the "ISPtiny" have been a better choice?
I now beleive that this is a case of it being a 1MHz factory clock rate - so that brings me back to the question about getting around slow clocks (I used to have the jumper option on my homemade original)
You shouldn't need to slow the programming clock rate down to program an ATMega328. Just do the follow steps via the Arduino IDE to burn the bootloader:
1) Connect the UASBasp to your Uno or ATMega328
2) Select tools->Board->Arduino/Genuino Uno
3) Select tools->programmer->UASBasp
4) Select tools->Burn bootloader
It will then just burn the Uno bootloader into your device. It's really that simple.
Using the Arduino IDE you can only program the bootloader or a sketch at any one time. Remember it blanks the chip first and so will wipe anything you had previously programmed. So if you burn the bootloader you will have no sketch and if you burn a sketch you will have no bootloader. To get both you have to burn the bootloader fist using the USBasp then upload a sketch in the normal way using the devices serial interface.... this was successful in that the blink went in OK ... and the boot loaded went out ... hey-ho. I will have to stick that back in as a second proof of programming.
TBH if you're using the USBasp to upload sketches then there's no point in having the bootloader as it only takes up space and takes longer for the device to restart after a reset.
Yes the Arduino IDE actually uses AVRdude in the background to do the programming. The fuse settings are passed to AVRdude via the command line.Presumably the fuses get done too ???