TXS0102/TCA9517 Difference Between These Parts

Kato-san,

The TXS0102 and TCA9517 are fundamentally quite different parts. Allow me to explain:

The TXS0102 is a pass-FET translator with rise time accelerators on each side to assist in buffering the buffering the signal. However, this means that the two sides are not isolated (aka, the pull-up resistors on 1 side will be seen by the opposite side of the TXS0102 as well).

The TCA9517 is a true buffer, in the sense that both sides are isolated from each other (current does not flow from the A port to the B port directly). Instead, the TCA9517 has pull down fets that activate once the voltage on the opposite side is low enough. THe flip side of this, is that you get a static voltage offset on the B side (VOL = ~0.5V on B side) in order to prevent the device from detecting its own low as an external devices' low.