Debugging Serial Buses
Debugging Serial Buses
Debugging Serial Buses
Application Note
Application Note
Introduction
Embedded systems are literally everywhere in our society today. A simple definition of an embedded system is a specialpurpose computer system that is part of a larger system or machine with the intended purpose of providing monitoring and control services to that system or machine. The typical embedded system starts running some special purpose application as soon as it is turned on and will not stop until it is turned off. Virtually every electronic device designed and produced today is an embedded system. A short list of embedded system examples include: Alarm clocks Automatic teller machines Cellular phones Computer printers Antilock brake controllers Microwave ovens Inertial guidance systems for missiles DVD players Personal digital assistants (PDAs) Programmable logic controllers (PLC) for industrial automation and monitoring Portable music players Maybe even your toaster Embedded systems can contain many different types of devices including microprocessors, microcontrollers, DSPs, RAM, EPROMs, FPGAs, A/Ds, D/As, and I/O. These various devices have traditionally communicated with each other and the outside world using wide parallel buses. Today, however, more and more of the building blocks used in embedded system design are replacing these wide parallel buses with serial buses for the following reasons: Less board space required due to fewer signals to route Lower cost Lower power requirements Fewer pins on packages Embedded clocks Differential signaling for better noise immunity Wide availability of components using standard serial interfaces
Figure 1. Logic Analyzer acquisition of a microcontrollers clock, address bus, data bus and control lines.
While serial buses provide a number of advantages, they also pose some significant challenges to an embedded system designer due simply to the fact that information is being transmitted in a serial fashion rather than parallel. This application note discusses common challenges for embedded system designers and how to overcome them using capabilities found in the following series of oscilloscopes: DPO/DSA/MSO70000C/D, DPO7000C, MSO/DPO5000, MDO4000, MSO/DPO4000B, MSO/ DPO3000 and MSO/DPO2000 Series.
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Even with a simpler serial standard such as I2C, it is still significantly harder to observe what is being transmitted over the bus than it is with a parallel protocol. I2C uses separate clock and data lines, so at least in this case you can use the clock as a reference point. However, you still need to find the start of the message (data going low while the clock is high), manually inspect and write down the data value on every rising edge of the clock, and then organize the bits into the message structure. It can easily take a couple of minutes of work just to decode a single message in a long acquisition and you have no idea if thats the message you are actually looking for. If its not, then you need to start this tedious and error prone process over on the next one. It would be nice to just trigger on the message content you are looking for, however the state and pattern triggers youve used for years on scopes and logic analyzers wont do you any good here. They are designed to look at a pattern occurring at the same time across multiple channels. To work on a serial bus, their trigger engines would need to be tens to hundreds of states deep (one state per bit). Even if this trigger capability existed, it would not be a fun task programming it state-by-state for all these bits. There has to be a better way! There is a better way. The following sections highlight how Tektronix oscilloscopes1 can be used with some of the most common low-speed serial standards used in embedded system design.
Support for serial bus standards vary depending on the oscilloscope model. For a table of buses supported by different Tektronix oscilloscopes, please see Appendix A or visit www.tektronix.com.
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Application Note
Start
Address 7 or 10 bits
R/W 1 bit
Ack 1 bit
Data0 8 bits
Ack0 1 bit
Data1 8 bits
Ack1 1 bit
... 1 bit
DataN 8 bits
AckN 1 bit
Stop
I2C
Background
I2C, or I squared C, stands for Inter-Integrated Circuit. It was originally developed by Philips in the early 1980s to provide a low-cost way of connecting controllers to peripheral chips in TV sets, but has since evolved into a worldwide standard for communication between devices in embedded systems. The simple two-wire design has found its way into a wide variety of chips like I/O, A/Ds, D/As, temperature sensors, microcontrollers and microprocessors from numerous leading chipmakers including: Analog Devices, Atmel, Infineon, Cyprus, Intel, Maxim, Philips, Silicon Laboratories, ST Microelectronics, Texas Instruments, Xicor, and others.
400 kb/s (fast mode), and 3.4 Mb/s (high-speed mode). The maximum number of devices is determined by a maximum capacitance of 400 pF or roughly 20-30 devices. The I2C standard specifies the following format in Figure 4: Start - indicates the device is taking control of the bus and that a message will follow. Address - a 7 or 10 bit number representing the address of the device that will either be read from or written to. R/W Bit - one bit indicating if the data will be read from or written to the device. Ack - one bit from the slave device acknowledging the masters actions. Usually each address and data byte has an acknowledge, but not always. Data - an integer number of bytes read from or written to the device. Stop - indicates the message is complete and the master has released the bus. There are two ways to group I2C addresses for decoding: in 7-bits plus a read or write (R/W) bit scheme, and in 8-bits (a byte) where the R/W bit is included as part of the address. The 7-bit address scheme is the specified I2C Standard followed by firmware and software design engineers. But many other engineers use the 8-bit address scheme. Tektronix oscilloscopes can decode data in either scheme.
How It Works
I2Cs physical two-wire interface is comprised of bi-directional serial clock (SCL) and data (SDA) lines. I2C supports multiple masters and slaves on the bus, but only one master may be active at a time. Any I2C device can be attached to the bus allowing any master device to exchange information with a slave device. Each device is recognized by a unique address. A device can operate as either a transmitter or a receiver, depending on its function. Initially, I2C only used 7-bit addresses, but evolved to allow 10-bit addressing as well. Three bit rates are supported: 100 kb/s (standard mode),
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EEPROM
Temperature Sensor 1
DAC
Temperature Sensor 2
We know that the two sensors are addresses 18 and 19 on the I2C bus, so we decide to set up a trigger event to look for a write to address 18 (the fan speed controller polling the sensor for the current temperature). The triggered acquisition is shown in the screenshot Figure 7.
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Application Note
Bus Condition Starts are indicated by vertical green bars. Repeated starts occur when another start is shown without a previous Stop.
Indicated by:
Addresses are shown in yellow boxes along with a [W] for write or [R] for read. Address values can be displayed in either hex or binary. Data is shown in cyan boxes. Data values can be displayed in either hex or binary.
attempting to write to the temperature sensor. It then checked the temperature sensor at Address 19 and received back the desired information. So, why isnt the first temperature sensor responding to the fan controller? Taking a look at the part on the board we find that one of the address lines isnt soldered correctly. The temperature sensor was not able to communicate on the bus and the unit was overheating as a result. Weve managed to isolate this potentially elusive problem in a matter of a couple minutes due to the I2C trigger and bus decoding capability of the oscilloscope. In the example in Figure 7 we triggered on a write, but the oscilloscope's powerful I2C triggering includes many other capabilities: Start - triggers when SDA goes low while SCL is high. Repeated Start - triggers when a start condition occurs without a previous stop condition. This is usually when a master sends multiple messages without releasing the bus. Stop - triggers when SDA goes high while SCL is high. Missing Ack - slaves are often configured to transmit an acknowledge after each byte of address and data. The oscilloscope can trigger on cases where the slave does not generate the acknowledge bit. Address - triggers on a user specified address or any of the pre-programmed special addresses including General Call, Start Byte, HS-mode, EEPROM, or CBUS. Addressing can be either 7 or 10 bits and is entered in binary or hex. Data - triggers on up to 12 bytes of user specified data values entered in either binary or hex. Address and Data - this allows you to enter both address and data values as well as read vs. write to capture the exact event of interest. These triggers allow you to isolate the particular bus traffic youre interested in, while the decoding capability enables you to instantly see the content of every message transmitted over the bus in your acquisition.
In this case, channel 1 (yellow) is connected to SCLK and channel 2 (cyan) to SDA. The purple waveform is the I2C bus weve defined by inputting just a few simple parameters to the oscilloscope. The upper portion of the display shows the entire acquisition. In this case weve captured a lot of bus idle time with a burst of activity in the middle which weve zoomed in on. The lower, larger portion of the display is the zoom window. As you can see, the oscilloscope has decoded the content of each message going across the bus. Buses use the colors and marks in Table 1 to indicate important parts of the message. Taking a look at the acquired waveforms, we can see that the oscilloscope did indeed trigger on a Write to address 18 (shown in the lower left of the display). In fact, the fan speed controller attempted to write to address 18 twice, but in both cases it did not receive an acknowledge after
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Slave #1
Slave #1
MOSI
MOSI
MISO
SPI Master
SPI Master
SCLK MOSI MISO SS SS3
Slave #2
SS2 SCLK SS2 MOSI MISO
Slave #2
Slave #3
MISO
Slave #3
MOSI MISO
SPI
Background
The Serial Peripheral Interface bus (SPI) was originally developed by Motorola in the late 1980s for their 68000 series micro-controllers. Due to the simplicity and popularity of the bus, many other manufacturers have adopted the standard over the years. It is now found in a broad array of components commonly used in embedded system design. SPI is primarily used between micro-controllers and their immediate peripheral devices. Its commonly found in cell phones, PDAs, and other mobile devices to communicate data between the CPU, keyboard, display, and memory chips.
In Figure 8, each slave only talks to the master. However, SPI can be wired with the slave devices daisy-chained, each performing an operation in turn, and then sending the results back to the master as shown in Figure 9. So, as you can see, there is no standard for SPI implementation. In some cases, where communication from the slave back to the master is not required, the MISO signal may be left out all together. In other cases there is only one master and one slave device and the SS signal is tied to ground. This is commonly referred to as 2-wire SPI. When an SPI data transfer occurs, an 8-bit data word is shifted out on MOSI while a different 8-bit data word is being shifted in on MISO. This can be viewed as a 16-bit circular shift register. When a transfer occurs, this 16-bit shift register is shifted 8 positions, thus exchanging the 8-bit data between the master and slave devices. A pair of registers, clock polarity (CPOL) and clock phase (CPHA) determine the edges of the clock on which the data is driven. Each register has two possible states which allows for four possible combinations, all of which are incompatible with one another. So a master/slave pair must use the same parameter values to communicate. If multiple slaves are used that are fixed in different configurations, the master will have to reconfigure itself each time it needs to communicate with a different slave.
How It Works
The SPI bus is a master/slave, 4-wire serial communications bus. The four signals are clock (SCLK), master output/ slave input (MOSI), master input/slave output (MISO), and slave select (SS). Whenever two devices communicate, one is referred to as the "master" and the other as the slave. The master drives the serial clock. Data is simultaneously transmitted and received, making it a full-duplex protocol. Rather than having unique addresses for each device on the bus, SPI uses the SS line to specify which device data is being transferred to or from. As such, each unique device on the bus needs its own SS signal from the master. If there are 3 slave devices, there are 3 SS leads from the master, one to each slave as shown in Figure 8.
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Application Note
Synthesizer VCO
SCLK
DAC
SS2
SS3
I/O
Figure 12. Acquiring synthesizer configuration messages off the SPI bus.
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In the example above we used a simple SS Active trigger. The full SPI triggering capability in the Tektronix oscilloscopes include the following types: SS Active - triggers when the slave select line goes true for a slave device. Start of Frame - triggers at the start of a frame when the clock idle time is used to define the frame timing. MOSI - trigger on up to 16 bytes of user specified data from the master to a slave. MISO - trigger on up to 16 bytes of user specified data from a slave to the master. MOSI/MISO - trigger on up to 16 bytes of user specified data for both master to slave and slave to master (available only with DPOxEMBD application modules). Again, these triggers allow you to isolate the particular bus traffic youre interested in, while the decoding capability enables you to instantly see the content of every message transmitted over the bus in your acquisition.
Upon seeing all 0s at the end of the messages we realize weve made one of the most common mistakes with SPI by programming the bits in each 24-bit word in reverse order in the software. A quick change in the software results in the following acquisition and a VCO correctly locked at 2.5 GHz as shown in Figure 13.
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Application Note
USB Speed Low-Speed USB 2.0 Full-Speed USB 2.0 High-Speed USB 2.0
Host Controller
5 Gbps
200 ps
Hub
Device
Hub
Device
USB
Background
The Universal Serial Bus (USB) has become a dominant interface on todays personal computers, replacing many of the external serial and parallel buses previously used. Since its introduction in 1995, USB has grown beyond its original personal computer usage and has become a ubiquitous interface used in many types of electronic devices. The USB 2.0 specification released in 2000 covers most of the USB devices that are being used today. USB 2.0 replaced the USB 1.1 specification, adding a high-speed interface (see Table 2) to the low-speed and full-speed interfaces in the USB 1.1 specification. USB has expanded beyond just system-to-system communication. For example, the Inter-Chip USB (IC_USB) and the High-Speed Inter-Chip (HSIC) USB are used for chip-to-chip communications. Supplements to the USB 2.0 specification cover IC_USB, HSIC and other enhancements. In 2008, the USB 3.0 specification was released. USB 3.0 is called SuperSpeed USB and is ten times faster than high-speed USB 2.0. SuperSpeed USB preserves backward compatibility with USB 2.0 devices. USB 3.0 is an additional specification that is used in conjunction with the USB 2.0 specification and does not replace it. SuperSpeed USB devices must implement USB 2.0 device framework commands and descriptors.
Device
Device
Hub
Device
Device
Device
Device
Device
Device
The USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF) manages and promotes USB standards and USB technology. USB specifications are available at the USB-IF web site at www.usb.org.
How It Works
The USB configuration is one host controller with 1 to 127 devices. USB is a tiered-star topology with optional hubs to expand the bus (Figure 14). The host is the only master and it controls all bus traffic. The host initiates all device communications and devices do not have the capability to interrupt the host. There are four USB speeds as shown in Table 2. A high-speed device starts out at full-speed and then transitions to highspeed. The speed of a USB 2.0 bus is limited by the slowest device connected to the host controller. With SuperSpeed USB, two host controllers are used: one for SuperSpeed USB devices and one for USB 2.0 devices. Like a USB 2.0 system, the speed of the bus with USB 2.0 devices is limited by the slowest device.
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Host Controller
Host Controller
Source Pipe Sink Pipe
Upstream Port
Device Address 0 to 127 Endpoint 0 Endpoint 0 Data Source Data Sink Endpoint 15 Endpoint 15 Data Source Data Sink
Downstream Port
Figure 15. USB endpoints are the devices data sources and sinks that have logical pipes to the application software.
Device Endpoints
Device endpoints are data sources and sinks in the device. Each device can have up to 16 data endpoints (Figure 15). Endpoint 0 is mandatory and is used by the host to communicate to the device. A pipe is the logical connection between the application software in the host and device endpoint.
Electrical Configuration
The host uses an upstream A connector and devices use a downstream B connector, as shown in Figure 16. Each connector has three versions: standard, mini and micro. The USB 2.0 cable has four wires as shown in Figure 16. Two wires are used to provide power from the host: 5 V power (red wire) and ground (black wire). The connectors are designed so that the power and ground pins are connected before the data pins. The host provides current from 100 mA to 500 mA with intelligent power management. For example, power to a device can be monitored by the host or hub and switched off if an over-current condition occurs.
Enumeration
Enumeration is the configuration process that occurs at power-on or when a device is hot plugged. The host detects the presence of the device on the USB bus. Next, the host polls the device with the SETUP token using address 0 and endpoint 0. Then, the host assigns a unique address to the device in the range of 1 to 127. Also, the host identifies the device speed and data transfer type. During enumeration a devices class is determined. The device class defines a devices functionality such as printer, mass storage, video, audio, human interface, etc.
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Application Note
Bit Rate OUT IN SOF SETUP DATA0 DATA1 DATA2 MDATA ACK NAK STALL NYET PRE ERR SPLIT PING Reserved
Bit Period
In the J idle state, a low-speed device pulls D- high resulting in a negative differential voltage. A full-speed device pulls D+ high resulting in a positive differential voltage. The K state is opposite of the J state. Data transmission uses non return to zero inverted (NRZI) encoding with bit stuffing to ensure a minimum number of transitions. The least significant bit is transmitted first and the most significant bit is transmitted last.
0001 1001 0101 1101 0011 1011 0111 1111 0010 1010 1110 0110 1100 1100 1000 0100 0000
Data
Packets
The packets are the fundamental elements of USB communications. Packets start with a synchronization field followed by the packet identifier. After the packet identifier is no field or other fields depending upon the type of packet. The end-of-packet field terminates the packet. Starting from the J idle state, a packet starts with an 8-bit synchronization (SYNC) field for low-speed and full-speed USB. SYNC is 3 KJ pairs followed by two Ks (Figure 17). The SYNC field for high-speed USB is 15 KJ pairs followed by two Ks and hubs are allowed to reduce the repeating SYNC field to 5 KJ pairs followed by two Ks. Packet identifier (PID) is the second packet byte composed of a 4-bit PID and its 4-bit PID complement for error checking. A PID encoding error is when the first PID 4-bits do not match the complement of the last PID 4-bits. Bits are sent out onto the bus least-significant bit first and most-significant bit last. The PID 4-bit value identifies 17 types of packets as shown in Table 4. Notice packet PRE and ERR have the same PID code. Packet type groups are token, data, handshake and special. The end-of-packet (EOP) is three bits long. EOP starts with two bits of SE0 and ends with one bit of J state.
Handshake
Special
A twisted differential pair Data+ (D+ green wire) and Data(D- white wire) wires are used for bidirectional communications using half-duplex differential signaling controlled by the host. Signal levels are listed in Table 3. The bus is DC coupled. The host pulls down both D+ and D- when no device is connected. This is called single-ended zero (SE0) state. The USB bus voltage is pulled positive or negative when a device is connected to the USB bus and the polarity indicates the speed of the device.
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Sync
PID
EOP
Sync
PID
11-bit Address
5-bit CRC
EOP
Sync
PID
Data
16-bit CRC
EOP
Sync
PID
Frame Number
5-bit CRC
EOP
Handshake Packets
Handshake packets such as data packet accepted (ACK) and data packet not accepted (NAK) are composed of the Sync byte, PID byte and EOP as seen in Figure 18.
Data Packets
Data packets contain a PID byte, data bytes and 16-bit CRC as shown in Figure 20. DATA0 and DATA1 packets have a 1-bit sequence number that is used in stop and wait automatic repeat-request handshake. DATA0 and DATA1 packets alternate in error free transmission. Data packets are resent with the same sequence number when a transmission error occurs. An error free data transaction is when the host sends a DATA0 packet to the device, the device sends a handshake ACK packet and then the host sends a DATA1 packet. If the host does not receive a handshake ACK packet or received a NAK from the device, it resends the DATA0 packet. If the device sent an ACK packet and receives the data packet with the same sequence number, the device acknowledges the data packet but ignores the data as a duplicate.
Token Packets
Host sent token packets are composed of the SYNC, PID followed by two bytes composed of an 11-bit address and 5-bit cyclic redundancy check (CRC) (Figure 19). The OUT, IN and SETUP tokens 11-bit address is subdivided into a 7-bit device address and a 4-bit endpoint identifier. Address zero is special and is for a device that has not been assigned an address at the beginning of the enumeration process. Later in the enumeration process the host assigns a nonzero address to the device. All devices have an endpoint zero. Endpoint zero is used for device control and status. Other device endpoints are for data sources and/or sinks. The host sends an OUT token to a device followed by a data packet. The host sends an IN token to a device and expects to receive a data packet or handshake packet such as NAK from the device.
Start of Frame
Start of Frame (SOF) packet, shown in Figure 21, is used to synchronize isochronous and polled data flows. The 11-bit frame number is incremented by one in each consecutive SOF.
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Application Note
A TDP1000 Differential Probe is used to probe a USB extension cable between the computer and the USB memory device. Before connecting the probe to the cable, we use the TDP1000 menu button on the probe to AutoZero the probes 4.25 V range. To define a USB bus, we go to the bus menu and select USB from the list of supported standards. We then follow the setup buttons from left to right to define the parameters of our bus: speed, source channels, type of probe, and thresholds. The full-speed preset 1.4 V and -1.4 V thresholds are used in this example. First, we can check the enumeration process by triggering on the SETUP token. After enumeration, we can verify the Start of Frame (SOF) packets by triggering on them and verifying the speed by checking if the J idle state is positive or by measuring the bit width of the SOF SYNC field. Next, we can configure the oscilloscope to trigger on a NAK token and then put the oscilloscope in Single acquisition mode. We then have the computer request data from the memory device. If the memory device is ready to transfer data, the oscilloscope will not trigger. But, if the memory device is not ready to transfer data, it will send a NAK in response to the computer host IN token and the oscilloscope will trigger on the NAK. Figure 22 shows the NAK acquisition.
Figure 22. Full-speed memory device responded with a NAK to the host first IN token request at cursor A.
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Available USB triggering capability includes the following types: SYNC Reset Suspend Resume End of Packet (EOP) Token (Address) Packet SETUP, IN, OUT and SOF Data Packet Any data value, DATA0, DATA1, DATA2 or MDATA
Figure 23. Decoded High-speed USB 2.0 waveform captured with serial triggering on an MSO5204 with option SR-USB.
We can also copy the oscilloscope trigger settings to be the search criteria for Wave Inspector. Wave Inspector will search through the entire acquisition looking for every instance of a NAK. In this case, Wave Inspector found 11 NAKs. The first NAK is at the trigger position and the other 10 NAKs are after the trigger. All NAKs are in response to the computer host resending the IN token. Each NAK is easily viewed by using Wave Inspector next and previous front-panel buttons to jump to each marked NAK.
Any handshake value, or ACK, NAK, STALL, or NYET Special packets Reserved, PRE, or ERR, SPLIT, or PING Error types include PID Check Bits, Token CRC5, Data CRC16 or Bit stuffing Wave Inspector can also search on all of the same criteria used for triggering. With Tektronix oscilloscopes, you can easily capture and analyze USB 2.0 signals, protocol, and data and then correlate them to other analog and digital signals to provide you with complete design visibility.
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Application Note
Type Bytes
Preamble 7
Start-offrame Delimiter 1
Destination Address 6
Source Address 6
Length/ Type 2
Ethernet
Background
Ethernet is a family of frame-based computer networking technologies for local area networks (LANs), initially developed at Xerox PARC in the early 1970s. The first standard draft was published in 1980 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Approval of IEEE 802.3 CSMA/CD occurred in 1982 and the international ISO/IEEE 802.3 standard was approved in 1984.
The Ethernet data frame format is defined by the IEEE 802.3 standard and contains seven fields, as shown in Figure 24. The Preamble is seven bytes long consisting of an alternating pattern of ones and zeros for synchronization. The Start-of-frame Delimiter is a single byte with alternating ones and zeros but ending in two ones. The Destination and Source Media Access Control (MAC) Addresses are each six bytes long, transmitted in mostsignificant to least-significant bit order. Each Ethernet node is assigned a unique MAC address which is used to specify both the destination and the source of each data packet. It thus forms the basis of most of the Link layer (OSI Layer 2) networking upon which upper layer protocols rely to produce complex, functioning networks. The Length/Type field is a two-byte value. If the decimal value of Length/Type is 1500, it represents the number of data bytes in the data field. If the value of Length/Type is >1536 (0x0600), it is an EtherType value which specifies the protocol that is encapsulated in the payload of the Ethernet frame. (For example, EtherType is set to 0x0800 for IPv4.) The Data packet contains 46 to 1500 bytes. If the data is less than 46 bytes long, the data field is padded to be 46 bytes long. The Frame Check Sequence is a 32-bit cyclic redundancy check (CRC) and provides error checking across the Destination Address, Source Address, Length/Type and Data fields. Finally, after each frame has been sent, transmitters are required to transmit a minimum of 12 bytes of idle characters before transmitting the next frame, or they must remain idle for an equal amount of time by de-asserting the transmit enable signal.
How It Works
Two of the most common versions of Ethernet are 10BASE-T and 100BASE-TX which are found on most personal computers. The leading number represents the data rate in Mb/s. BASE indicates that the signals are baseband signals and there is no RF signal modulation. The T denotes the twisted pair wires that are in the LAN cable that is used between network nodes. The popularity of 10BASE-T and 100BASE-TX and its decreasing hardware implementation cost has caused it to be incorporated in an increasing number of embedded systems designs. Ethernet provides peer-to-peer packet-based communication, enabling direct point-to-point communication. At the physical layer, the 10BASE-T and 100BASE-TX signals transport address, control, data, and clock information. The data is transferred in sequences of data bytes called packets. Ethernet packets can carry other, higher-level protocol packets inside of them. For example, an Ethernet packet may contain an Internet Protocol (IP) packet, which in turn may contain a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) packet. This signal complexity makes isolating events of interest difficult when analyzing 10BASE-T and 100BASE-TX waveforms.
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The oscilloscope can trigger on Ethernet packet content such as Start Frame Delimiter, MAC addresses, MAC length/type, MAC client data, Q-tag control information, IP header, TCP header, TCP/IPv4 client data, End of Packet, Idle (100BASETX and DPO4ENET only), and FCS (CRC) errors. The decoded display provides a higher-level, combined view of the individual signals that make up 10BASE-T and 100BASE-TX, making it easy to identify where packets begin and end and identifying sub-packet components such as preamble, SFD, MAC addresses, Data, FSC, errors, etc. Each packet on the bus is decoded, and the value can be displayed in hex, binary, or ASCII in the bus waveform. In addition to seeing decoded packet data on the bus waveform itself, you can view all captured packets in a tabular view much like you would see in a software listing. Packets are time stamped and listed consecutively with columns for each component (Time, Destination Address, Source Address, Length, Data, FCS/CRC, Errors). Serial triggering is very useful for isolating the event of interest, but once youve captured it and need to analyze the surrounding data, what do you do? The DPO4ENET and SR-ENET applications enable Wave Inspector to automatically search through the acquired data for user-defined criteria including serial packet content. Each occurrence is highlighted by a search mark. Rapid navigation between marks is as simple as pressing the Previous () and Next () buttons on the oscilloscope front panel.
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Application Note
RS-232
Background
RS-232 is a widely-used standard for serial communication between two devices over a short distance. It is best known for its use in older PC serial ports, but it is also used in embedded systems as a debug port or for linking two devices. The RS-232-C standard was introduced in 1969. The standard has been revised twice since then, but the changes are minor and the signals are interoperable with RS-232-C. There are also related standards, such as RS-422 and RS-485, which are similar but use differential signaling to communicate over longer distances.
Signal Carrier Detect Received Data Transmitted Data Data Terminal Ready Common Ground Data Set Ready Request to Send Clear to Send Ring Indicator
Pin 1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
How it Works
The two devices are referred to as the DTE (data terminal equipment) and DCE (data circuit-terminating equipment). In some applications, the DTE device controls the DCE device; in other applications, the two devices are peers and the distinction between DTE and DCE is arbitrary. The RS-232 standard specifies numerous signals, many of which are not commonly used. The two most important signals are Transmitted Data (Tx) and Received Data (Rx). Tx carries data from the DTE to the DCE. The DTE devices Tx line is the DCE devices Rx line. Similarly, Rx carries data from the DCE to the DTE. The RS-232 standard does not specify which connectors to use. Twenty-five-pin and nine-pin connectors are most common. Other connectors have ten, eight, or six pins. Its also possible to connect two RS-232 devices on the same board, without using standard connectors. When connecting two RS-232 devices, a null modem is commonly required. This device swaps several lines, including the Tx and Rx lines. That way, each device can send data on its Tx line and receive data on its Rx line. Table 5 shows the pinout used for a 9-pin connector, commonly used with RS-232 signals. Remember that if your signal has passed through a null modem, many of the signals will be swapped. Most importantly, Tx and Rx will be swapped.
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Start 1 bit
Data0 1 bit
Data1 1 bit
Data2 1 bit
Data3 1 bit
Data4 1 bit
Data5 1 bit
Data6 1 bit
Data7
(opt.)
Parity
(opt.)
1 bit
1 bit
When probing RS-232 signals, it is often helpful to use a breakout box. This device allows you to easily probe the signals inside an RS-232 cable. Breakout boxes are inexpensive and readily available from electronics dealers. The RS-232 standard does not specify the content transmitted across the bus. ASCII text is most common, but binary data is also used. The data is often broken up into packets. With ASCII text, packets are commonly terminated by a new line or carriage return character. With binary data other values, such as 00 or FF hex are commonly used. Devices often implement RS-232 using a universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter (UART). UARTs are widely available in off-the-shelf parts. The UART uses a shift register to convert a byte of data into a serial stream, and vice versa. In embedded designs, UARTs can also communicate directly without the use of RS-232 transceivers.
Figure 26 shows one byte of RS-232 data. The byte is composed of these bits. Start - The byte begins with a start bit. Data - Several bits of data follow. Eight bits of data is the most common; some applications use seven bits of data. Even when only seven bits are transmitted, the data is often informally referred to as a byte. In UART to UART communication, 9 bit data words are sometimes used. Parity - An optional parity bit. Stop - 1, 1.5, or 2 stop bits. An RS-232 bus does not have a clock line. Each device uses its own clock to determine when to sample the data lines. In many designs, a UART uses the rising edges of the Tx and Rx signals to synchronize its clock with the other devices clock.
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Application Note
Figure 28. Measuring time delay between messages on two RS-232 buses.
The oscilloscopes RS-232 trigger includes these capabilities: Tx Start Bit - triggers on the bit indicating the start of a byte. Tx End of Packet - triggers on the last byte in a packet. A packet can be ended by a specific byte: Null (00 hex), linefeed (0A hex), carriage return (0D hex), space (20 hex), or FF hex. Tx Data - triggers on up to 10 bytes of user-specified data values. Rx Start Bit, Rx End of Packet, and Rx Data - these are like the Tx triggers, but on the Rx line. With Tektronix oscilloscopes, you can easily view RS-232 signals, analyze them, and correlate them to other activity in your device.
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CAN
Background
The Controller Area Network (CAN) was originally developed in the 1980s by the Robert Bosch GmbH as a low cost communications bus between devices in electrically noisy environments. Mercedes-Benz became the first automobile manufacturer in 1992 to employ CAN in their automotive systems. Today, almost every automotive manufacturer uses CAN controllers and networks to control a variety of devices in the automobile. A newer and even lower cost bus called LIN (discussed next) was developed to address applications where the cost, versatility, and speed of CAN were overkill. LIN has displaced CAN in a number of applications, but CAN is still the primary bus used for engine timing controls, anti-lock braking systems and power train controls to name a few. And due to its electrical noise tolerance, minimal wiring, excellent error detection capabilities and high speed data transfer, CAN is rapidly expanding into other applications such as industrial control, marine, medical, aerospace, and more.
SOF 1 bit
Arbitration Field 11 bits (Std ID) 29 bits (Ext 1D) Control Field 6 bits Data Field 0-8 bytes CRC Field 16 bits ACK 2 bits EOF 7 bits INT 3 bits
Overload frames are initiated by receiving devices to indicate they are not ready to receive data yet. Data frames are used to transmit data while Remote frames request data. Data and Remote frames are controlled by start and stop bits at the beginning and end of each frame and include the following fields: Arbitration field, Control field, Data field, CRC field and an ACK field as shown Figure 29. SOF - The frame begins with a start of frame (SOF) bit Arbitration - The Arbitration field includes an Identifier (address) and the Remote Transmission Request (RTR) bit used to distinguish between a data frame and a data request frame, also called a remote frame. The identifier can either be standard format (11 bits - version 2.0A) or extended format (29 bits - version 2.0B). Control - The Control Field consists of six bits including the Identifier Extension (IDE) bit which distinguishes between a CAN 2.0A (11 bit identifier) standard frame and a CAN 2.0B (29 bit identifier) extended frame. The Control Field also includes the Data Length Code (DLC). The DLC is a four bit indication of the number of bytes in the data field of a Data frame or the number of bytes being requested by a Remote frame. Data The data field consists of zero to eight bytes of data. CRC - A fifteen bit cyclic redundancy check code and a recessive delimiter bit. ACK - The Acknowledge field is two bits long. The first is the slot bit, transmitted as recessive, but then overwritten by dominant bits transmitted from any node that successfully receives the transmitted message. The second bit is a recessive delimiter bit. EOF - Seven recessive bits indicate the end of frame (EOF).
How It Works
The CAN bus is a balanced (differential) 2-wire interface running over a Shielded Twisted Pair (STP), Un-shielded Twisted Pair (UTP), or ribbon cable. Each node uses a male 9-pin D connector. Non Return to Zero (NRZ) bit encoding is used with bit stuffing to ensure compact messages with a minimum number of transitions and high noise immunity. The CAN bus interface uses an asynchronous transmission scheme where any node may begin transmitting anytime the bus is free. Messages are broadcast to all nodes on the network. In cases where multiple nodes initiate messages at the same time, bitwise arbitration is used to determine which message is higher priority. Messages can be one of four types: Data Frame, Remote Transmission Request (RTR) Frame, Error Frame, or Overload Frame. Any node on the bus that detects an error transmits an error frame which causes all nodes on the bus to view the current message as incomplete and the transmitting node to resend the message.
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Application Note
The intermission (INT) field of three recessive bits indicates the bus is free. Bus Idle time may be any arbitrary length including zero. A number of different data rates are defined, with 1Mb/s being the fastest, and 5 kb/s the minimum rate. All modules must support at least 20 kb/s. Cable length depends on the data rate used. Normally all devices in a system transfer information at uniform and fixed bit rates. The maximum line length can be thousands of meters at low speeds; 40 meters at 1 Mb/s is typical. Termination resistors are used at each end of the cable.
Figure 31. Triggering on specific identifier and Data on a CAN bus and decoding all messages in the acquisition.
The white triangles in the figure are marks that weve placed on the waveform as reference points. These marks are added to or removed from the display by simply pressing the Set/ Clear Mark button on the front panel of the oscilloscope. Pressing the Previous and Next buttons on the front panel causes the zoom window to jump from one mark to the next making it simple to navigate between events of interest in the acquisition.
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Now imagine performing this task without these capabilities. Without the CAN triggering you would have to trigger on the switch itself, capture what you hope is a long enough time window of activity and then begin manually decoding frame after frame after frame on the CAN bus until you finally find the right one. What could have taken tens of minutes or hours before can now be accomplished in moments. The oscilloscope's powerful CAN triggering capability includes the following types: Start of Frame trigger on the SOF field. Frame Type choices are Data Frame, Remote Frame, Error Frame, and Overload Frame. Identifier trigger on specific 11 or 29 bit identifier values with Read / Write qualification. Data trigger on 1-8 bytes of user specified data. Missing Ack trigger anytime the receiving device does not provide an acknowledge. End of Frame trigger on the EOF field. These trigger types enable you to isolate virtually anything youre looking for on a CAN bus effortlessly. Triggering is just the beginning though. Troubleshooting will often require inspecting message content both before and after the trigger event. A simple way to view the contents of multiple messages in an acquisition is with the Event Table, as shown in Figure 32. The event table shows decoded message content for every message in an acquisition in a tabular format with timestamps. This makes it easy to not only view all the traffic on the bus but also enables easy timing measurements between messages. Event Tables are available for all types of buses the oscilloscope supports.
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Application Note
Header
Response
Break Field
Sync Field
Identifier Field
Data 1
Data 2
Data N
Checksum Field
LIN
Background
The Local Interconnect Network (LIN) bus was developed by the LIN consortium in 1999 as a lower cost alternative to the CAN bus for applications where the cost, versatility, and speed of CAN were overkill. These applications typically include communications between intelligent sensors and actuators such as window controls, door locks, rain sensors, windshield wiper controls, and climate control, to name a few. However, due to its electrical noise tolerance, error detection capabilities, and high speed data transfer, CAN is still used today for engine timing controls, anti-lock braking systems, power train controls and more.
How It Works
The LIN bus is a low-cost, single-wire implementation based on the Enhanced ISO9141 standard. LIN networks have a single master and one or more slaves. All messages are initiated by the master with only one slave responding to each message, so collision detection and arbitration capabilities are not needed as they are in CAN. Communication is based on UART/SCI with data being sent in eight-bit bytes along with a start bit, stop bit and no parity. Data rates range from 1 kb/s to 20 kb/s. While this may sound slow, it is suitable for the intended applications and minimizes EMI. The LIN bus is always in one of two states: active or sleep. When its active, all nodes on the bus are awake and listening for relevant bus commands. Nodes on the bus can be put to sleep by either the Master issuing a Sleep Frame or the bus going inactive for longer than a predetermined amount of time. The bus is then awakened by any node requesting a wake up or by the master node issuing a break field. LIN frames consist of two main parts, the header and the response. The header is sent by the master while the response is sent by the slave. The header and response each have subcomponents as shown in Figure 33.
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Header Components:
Break Field the break field is used to signal the beginning of a new frame. It activates and instructs all slave devices to listen to the remainder of the header. Sync Field the sync field is used by the slave devices to determine the baud rate being used by the master node and synchronize themselves accordingly. Identifier Field the identifier specifies which slave device is to take action.
Response Components:
Data the specified slave device responds with one to eight bytes of data. Checksum computed field used to detect errors in data transmission. The LIN standard has evolved through several versions that have used two different forms of checksums. Classic checksums are calculated only over the data bytes and are used in version 1.x LIN systems. Enhanced checksums are calculated over the data bytes and the identifier field and are used in version 2.x LIN systems.
Figure 34. LIN bus setup menu and decoded frame.
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Application Note
A powerful feature of the oscilloscope is the ability to define and decode up to 16 serial buses simultaneously. Going back to our earlier example with CAN bus; now imagine that the window controls are operated by a LIN bus. When the driver presses the Passenger Window Down control, a message is initiated on a LIN bus in the driver door, passed through a central CAN gateway and then sent on to another LIN network in the passenger door. In this case, we can trigger on the relevant message on one of the buses and capture and decode all three buses simultaneously, making it exceptionally easy to view traffic as it goes from one bus to another through the system. This is shown in Figure 35 where weve triggered on the first LIN message and captured all three buses. The oscilloscope's LIN triggering capability includes the following types: Sync trigger on the sync field Identifier trigger on a specific identifier Data trigger on 1-8 bytes of specific data values or data ranges Identifier & Data trigger on a combination of both identifier and data Wakeup Frame trigger on a wakeup frame Sleep Frame trigger on a sleep frame Error trigger on sync errors, ID parity errors, or checksum errors
Figure 35. Simultaneous capture and decode of multiple automotive serial buses.
These trigger types allow you to isolate anything youre looking for on a LIN bus faster than ever before. And with the other advanced serial features found in Tektronix oscilloscopes such as event tables and search & mark, debugging LIN based automotive designs has never been easier.
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Sync 3
Terminal Address 5
T/R 1
Subaddress / Mode 5
Sync 3
Parity 1
MIL-STD-1553
Background
Similar to the computer industrys LAN, MIL-STD-1553 is a military standard that defines the electrical and protocol characteristics of a serial bus initially designed for data communication in avionics applications. MIL-STD-1553 began with the development of the A2-K draft standard by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) in 1970. After government and military reviews and revisions, it was released as MIL-STD-1553 (USAF) in 1973. MIL-STD1553A was released in 1975 to support all of the branches of the military, and the SAE then released and froze the MIL-STD1553B standard to enable component manufacturers to build compliant products. The most recent changes, documented as Notice 2, was released in 1986 to provide a common set of operational characteristics. The standard is now overseen by SAE as commercial document AS15531. Although the standard was widely used in US military applications, it has also been used commercially in masstransportation, spacecraft, and manufacturing applications, and has been accepted and implemented by NATO and many other governments.
How It Works
MIL-STD-1553 asynchronously transmits messages of up to thirty-two 16-bit data words at bit rates of up to 10 Mb/s over shielded twisted-pair and twinax cabling. A 1553 network uses time-division multiplexed half-duplex communication to transmit data over a single cable. For safety-critical applications, dual redundant buses are commonly used to provide higher-reliability communications. Manchester II bi-phase encoding is used to allow direct or transformer coupling. Manchester encoding is self-clocking, independent of the bit sequence, and is DC-balanced. Because the information in Manchester coded signals is actually contained in the polarity and timing of the zero-crossings, the 1553 bus is tolerant of large variations in signal levels. MIL-STD-1553 defines three distinct word types: Command words, Data words, and Status words. All are twentybit structures, with a 3-bit synchronization field, a 16-bit information field, and finally an odd parity bit for simple error detection. The sync field is an invalid Manchester signal, with a single transition in the middle of the second bit time. A command/status sync has a negative transition in the middle, while a data sync has a positive transition. Command words, sent by the active bus controller, specify the function that a remote terminal is to perform. The 16bit information field contains a 5-bit terminal address which uniquely identifies the terminal, a transmit/receive bit, 5 bits of sub-address or mode, and 5 bits of word count or mode code. Data words, transmitted by either a bus controller or remote terminal, are sent with the most-significant-bit first.
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Application Note
Sync 3
Terminal Address ME 5 1
IB 1
SR 1
Reserved 3
BCR 1
Busy 1
SF 1
DBA 1
TF 1
Parity 1
Status words are returned by remote terminals in response to a valid message from the controller to acknowledge receipt of a message or to convey the remote terminal status. The first 5 bits of the 16-bit information field are the terminal address. The remaining bits represent specific status information, including Message Error, Instrumentation Bit, Service Request, Broadcast Command Received, Busy, Subsystem Flag, Dynamic Bus Acceptance, and Terminal Flag.
With the DPOxAERO application module or SR-AERO application, you can easily view MIL-STD-1553 serial signals, analyze them, and correlate them to other events in your design.
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reserved bit
Frame ID
Data 0
Data 1
Data 2
Data n
CRC
CRC
CRC
11 bits 1 11 1 1
24 bits
Header Segment
Payload Segment
Trailer Segment
FlexRay
Background
FlexRay is a relatively new automotive bus that is still being developed by a group of leading automotive companies and suppliers known as the FlexRay Consortium. As cars get smarter and electronics find their way into more and more automotive applications, manufacturers are finding that existing automotive serial standards such as CAN and LIN do not have the speed, reliability, or redundancy required to address X-by-wire applications such as brake-by-wire or steerby-wire. Today, these functions are dominated by mechanical and hydraulic systems. In the future they will be replaced by a network of sensors and highly reliable electronics that will not only lower the cost of the automobile, but also significantly increase passenger safety due to intelligent electronic based features such as anticipatory braking, collision avoidance, adaptive cruise control, etc.
How It Works
FlexRay is a differential bus running over either a Shielded Twisted Pair (STP) or an Un-shielded Twisted Pair (UTP) at speeds up to 10 Mb/s, significantly faster than LINs 20 kb/s or CANs 1 Mb/s rates. FlexRay uses a dual channel architecture which has two major benefits. First, the two channels can be configured to provide redundant communication in safety critical applications such as X-by-wire to ensure the message gets through. Second, the two channels can be configured to send unique information on each at 10 Mb/s, giving an overall bus transfer rate of 20 Mb/s in less safety-critical applications. FlexRay uses a time triggered protocol that incorporates the advantages of prior synchronous and asynchronous protocols via communication cycles that include both static and dynamic frames. Static frames are time slots of predetermined length allocated for each device on the bus to communicate during each cycle. Each device on the bus is also given a chance to communicate during each cycle via a Dynamic frame which can vary in length (and time). The FlexRay frame is made up of three major segments; the header segment, the payload segment, and the trailer segment. These segment each have their own components as shown in Figure 40.
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Application Note
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Data trigger on up to 16 bytes of data. Data window can be offset by a user specified number of bytes in a frame with a very long data payload. Desired data can be specified as a specific value or a range of values. Identifier & Data trigger on a combination of Frame ID and data. End of Frame trigger on static frames, dynamic frames, or all frames. Error trigger on a number of different error types including Header CRC errors, Trailer CRC errors, Null frame errors, Sync frame errors, and Startup frame errors. In addition to the triggering and decode features described above, DPO4AUTOMAX also provides eye diagram analysis of FlexRay signals to assist in diagnosing physical layer issues. Simply load the software package on a PC, connect it to the scope via LAN or USB, and click the Acquire Data button to get the information rich display shown in Figure 43. Analysis features include: Eye Diagram built from all messages in the acquisition with the currently selected frame highlighted in blue. Easily compare against TP1 or TP4 masks with violations highlighted in red. Decode currently selected frame is decoded over the analog waveform while the whole acquisition is decoded in the bottom part of the display.
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Application Note
Time Interval Error (TIE) Plot provides for easy visual investigation of jitter within frames. Error Checking errors are highlighted in red. Header and trailer CRCs are calculated and compared with transmitted frame. Timing Measurements rise time, fall time, TSS duration, frame time, average bit time, previous sync, next sync, previous cycle frame, next cycle frame. Find isolate the particular frame of interest based on packet content. Save save decoded acquisition to a .csv file for further offline analysis. This comprehensive set of FlexRay solutions, along with the previously discussed CAN and LIN capabilities, make the Tektronix oscilloscopes the ultimate debugging tool for automotive designs.
Figure 44. Searching on specified identifier and Data in a CAN bus acquisition.
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clock SCK
SCK
TRANSMITTER
RECEIVER
TRANSMITTER
WS SD
RECEIVER
TRANSMITTER = MASTER
RECEIVER = MASTER
CONTROLLER
SCK
TRANSMITTER
WS SD
RECEIVER
CONTROLLER = MASTER
Audio Buses
Background
I2S, or I squared S, stands for Inter-IC Sound. It was originally developed by Philips in the mid-1980s to provide a standardized communication path for digital audio signals in consumer electronic devices such as CD players and digital televisions. The consumer electronics market has continued to evolve over the last 20 years and so have the applications for the I2S bus. Today its commonly found in cell phones, MP3 players, set top boxes, professional audio equipment and gaming systems to name a few.
How It Works
The I2S bus is a master/slave 3-wire serial communications bus. The three signals are clock (SCK), word select (WS), and data (SD). Typically, the transmitter is the Master and the receiver is the Slave. However, in some cases, the receiver can act as the Master by generating the clock and the word select signals. Or the transmitter and the receiver can be controlled by another device if desired. These configuration scenarios are illustrated in Figure 45.
Serial data is transmitted in twos complement with the most significant bit (MSB) first. The MSB is transmitted first because the transmitter and receiver may have different word lengths. It isnt necessary for the transmitter to know how many bits the receiver can handle, nor does the receiver need to know how many bits are being transmitted. When the system word length is greater than the transmitter word length, the word is truncated (least significant data bits are set to 0) for data transmission. If the receiver is sent more bits than its word length, the bits after the least significant bit (LSB) are ignored. On the other hand, if the receiver is sent fewer bits than its word length, the missing bits are set to zero internally. And so, the MSB has a fixed position, whereas the position of the LSB depends on the word length. The transmitter always sends the MSB of the next word one clock period after the WS changes.
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Application Note
SCK
LSB
Left Channel WS
Right Channel
SD
WS
SD
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256 clks WS SCK SD LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB MSB LSB DAC_B4 32 clks
DAC_A1 32 clks
DAC_B1 32 clks
DAC_A2 32 clks
DAC_B2 32 clks
DAC_A3 32 clks
DAC_B3 32 clks
DAC_A4 32 clks
Data MSB
Figure 47. TDM Format.
LSB
zero
There are several variants of the I2S bus that are also commonly used called Left Justified (LJ), Right Justified (RJ), and Time Division Multiplexing (TDM). The major difference between I2S, LJ, and RJ is where the data is placed in time relative to the Word Select signal. With I2S, the MSB is delayed one clock after WS. With LJ, the data bits are aligned with WS and with RJ, the data bits are right aligned with WS. These are all illustrated in Figure 46. TDM is similar to I2S, LJ, and RJ, but
allows for more than two audio channels. The example shown in Figure 47 has eight audio channels, each with 32 data bits. All of these digital audio buses have a very simple data structure. Many of the other buses weve looked at in this application note have address fields, CRC fields, parity bits, start/stop bits, and various other indicator bits, but the digital audio buses simply have data values for each channel.
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Application Note
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Data identifier
Start Of Transmission
ECC: 8 bits
End Of Transmission
Short Packet
Data identifier
Start Of Transmission
ECC: 8 bits
Checksum: 16 bits
End Of Transmission
Long Packet
How it Works
The D-PHY physical layer specifies a high-speed serial link between a host processor and another device such as a display or a camera. A minimum bus configuration is a clock lane and a single data lane; however, up to four data lanes can be used for increased bus bandwidth. Buses operate in one of two modes; low-power and highspeed. Low-power mode uses single-ended signaling and embeds the clock in the data. It is typically used for command and control purposes and has a maximum data transfer rate of 10 Mb/s. High-speed mode uses differential signaling and is typically used for fast data transfer. For example, a cell phone displays vertical and horizontal synchronization information may be transmitted in low-power mode as relatively little information needs to be transmitted and low transfer rates are adequate. However, the actual video content displayed on the phone requires large, high-speed data transfers to support todays high resolution displays and thus, utilizes high-speed mode. While the actual maximum transfer rate in high-speed mode is implementation-specific, the overall bus will typically operate in the 80 Mb/s 1 Gb/s range, per lane. The DSI-1 and CSI-2 protocols specify that information is transmitted across the D-PHY physical layer using a combination of short packets and long packets. Short packets are typically used for command and control type information such as synchronization and configuration while long packets are typically used for video content. Short packets are structured as follows: Data Identifier eight bits that include the Virtual Channel and Data Type fields which are discussed next.
Virtual Channel the virtual channel field specifies which device on the bus the packet is intended for when more than one camera or display device is on the bus. With two bits, up to four devices can share a single bus. Data Type These six bits specify what type of command or action is being sent and what the data in the Packet Data field represents and how its structured. ECC this is an error correction field that enables single bit errors to be corrected and 2-bit errors to be detected in short packets. Long packets have a few more fields. Long packets are structured as follows: Virtual Channel, Data Type, and ECC are the same as in short packets. Differences from short packets include: Word Count in a long packet, word count replaces packet data. This 16 bit value specifies the number of bytes included in the payload data. Payload This field is typically used to send large amounts of video data via a number of different video formats. Each format has its own Data Type. The payload field can be anywhere from 0 to 65,535 (216 -1) bytes long. Checksum this field checks for errors in the payload.
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Application Note
Figure 52. MSO70000C digital-channel decoded display of a Packed Pixel Stream, 24bit RGB 8-8-8 Format long packet.
Figure 53. MSO70000C analog-channel decoded display of a Packed Pixel Stream, showing a checksum error.
By default, the virtual channel and the word count fields are displayed in decimal. The Data Type field indicates the type of packet. ECC and Checksum are both displayed in hex. Finally, for defined data types, the payload field decodes the data being transmitted into relevant display-type information. In the example shown above, the first pixel value transmitted in the payload has a Red value of 255, a Green value of 216, and a Blue value of 0. In addition to decoding DSI-1 / CSI-2 acquisitions, you can also search through long acquisitions to find all occurrences of the following types of packet content: Short packets (specify VC, DT, Direction, and Packet Data values) Long packets (specify VC, DT, Direction, WC, and Data Payload including Pixel values) Stop Start of Transmission (SoT) End of Transmission (EoT) Bus Turnaround (DSI-1 only) Escape Mode ECC Warning ECC Error Checksum Error With the SR-DPHY application and the appropriate Tektronix oscilloscope, you can easily decode and view DSI-1 and CSI-2 serial bus packets, analyze them, and correlate them to other activity in your device.
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Of course, searches are also available for the more traditional trigger types as well. Search types include edges, pulse widths, runt, setup & hold times, logic and rise/fall times.
Conclusion
While there are many benefits in transitioning from parallel to serial buses in embedded systems design, there are also a number of challenges the design engineer faces. With traditional test and measurement tools its much more difficult to trigger on the event youre looking for, it can be nearly impossible to tell what information is present by just looking at the analog signal and its an extremely time consuming and error prone process to have to manually decode a long period of bus activity to diagnose problems. The Tektronix oscilloscopes change everything. With their powerful trigger, decode, and search capabilities todays design engineers can solve embedded system design issues with exceptional efficiency.
Appendix A: Tektronix offers a range of models to meet your needs and your budget:
DSA/DPO70000D Series Bandwidth
33 GHz, 25 GHz
DPO7000C Series
3.5 GHz, 2.5 GHz, 1 GHz, 500 MHz 4 analog
MSO/DPO5000 Series
2 GHz, 1 GHz, 500 MHz, 350 MHz 4 analog, 16 digital (MSO Series) 12.5 M (standard) Up to 125 M (optional) Up to 10 GS/s 10.4 in. XGA SR-EMBD: I C, SPI SR-COMP: RS-232/422/485 UART SR-USB: USB 2.0 SR-DPHY: MIPI decoding VNM: CAN, LIN decoding SR-AERO: MIL-STD-1553 SR-AUTO: CAN, LIN, FlexRay SR-810B: 8b/10b decoding SR-PCIE: PCI Express decoding SR-ENET: 10/100BASE-T Ethernet
2
MDO4000 Series
1 GHz, 500 MHz
MSO/DPO4000B Series
1 GHz, 500 MHz, 350 MHz 2 or 4 analog, 16 digital (MSO Series) Up to 20 M
MSO/DPO3000 Series
500 MHz, 300 MHz, 100 MHz 2 or 4 analog, 16 digital (MSO Series) 5M
MSO/DPO2000 Series
200 MHz, 100 MHz
Channels
4 analog
4 analog, 16 digital, 1 RF 20 M
Record Length (All Channels) Sample Rate (Analog) Color Display Serial Bus Triggering and Analysis Applications
Up to 31 M (standard), Up to 250 M (optional) Up to 100 GS/s 12.1 in. XGA SR-EMBD: I C, SPI SR-COMP: RS-232/422/485 UART SR-USB: USB 2.0 SR-DPHY: MIPI decoding SR-AERO: MIL-STD-1553 SR-AUTO: CAN, LIN, FlexRay SR-810B: 8b/10b decoding SR-PCIE: PCI Express SR-ENET: 10/100BASE-T Ethernet decoding
2
12.5 M (standard), Up to 125 M (optional) Up to 40 GS/s 12.1 in. XGA SR-EMBD: I C, SPI SR-COMP: RS-232/422/485 UART SR-USB: USB 2.0 SR-DPHY: MIPI decoding LSA: CAN, LIN decoding SR-AERO: MIL-STD-1553 SR-AUTO: CAN, LIN, FlexRay SR-810B: 8b/10b decoding SR-PCIE: PCI Express decoding SR-ENET: 10/100BASE-T Ethernet decoding
2
Up to 5 GS/s 10.4 in. XGA DPO4EMBD: I C, SPI DPO4USB: USB 2.0 DPO4COMP: RS-232/422/485/ UART DPO4AUTO: CAN, LIN DPO4AUTOMAX: CAN, LIN, FlexRay DPO4AUDIO: I2S/ LJ/RJ/TDM DPO4ENET: 10/100BASE-T Ethernet DPO4AERO: MIL-STD-1553
2
Up to 5 GS/s 10.4 in. XGA DPO4EMBD: I C, SPI DPO4USB: USB 2.0 DPO4COMP: RS-232/422/485/ UART DPO4AUTO: CAN, LIN DPO4AUTOMAX: CAN, LIN, FlexRay DPO4AUDIO: I2S/ LJ/RJ/TDM DPO4ENET: 10/100BASE-T Ethernet DPO4AERO: MIL-STD-1553
2
2.5 GS/s 9 in. WVGA DPO3EMBD: I C, SPI DPO3COMP: RS-232/422/485/ UART DPO3AUTO: CAN, LIN DPO3FLEX: FlexRay DPO3AUDIO: I2S/LJ/RJ/TDM DPO3AERO: MIL-STD-1553
2
1 GS/s 7 in. WQVGA DPO2EMBD: I2C, SPI DPO2COMP: RS-232/422/485/ UART DPO2AUTO: CAN, LIN
16
16
16
16
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Copyright 2012, Tektronix. All rights reserved. Tektronix products are covered by U.S. and foreign patents, issued and pending. Information in this publication supersedes that in all previously published material. Specification and price change privileges reserved. TEKTRONIX and TEK are registered trademarks of Tektronix, Inc. All other trade names referenced are the service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. 01/13 EA/WWW 48W-19040-13