TMS320F28384D: Requirement of 7 UART Channels

Hello,

MohanaSundari Sivakumar said:

I have a requirement of 7 UART channels in my overall application.  As per the datasheet the above chip supports 4 SCI channels ,one CM-UART

Correct, there are 5 UART channels available in total. The F28P65x has an additional UART channel as it has 2 SCI channels, 2 UART channels, and 2 LIN channels (which can be configured in UART mode).

MohanaSundari Sivakumar said:

What is the alternative approach? Can I use USB of the TMS 320F28384D chip for this purpose? kindly clarify. 

I will loop in a USB expert about this question and get back to you.

MohanaSundari Sivakumar said:

And also what is the function of  FSi_Rx mode ? Is it work similar to UART channel? Kindly clarify. I am a bit struck as I was not able to finalise the number of channel requirements.Also suggest me what best can be done?

The FSI module is also a communication peripheral but uses an FSI protocol rather than a UART protocol like the UART and SCI modules. The FSI RX module receives data in "frames" containing different fields, see section 32.3.4 Frame Format in the F2838x User Guide. The device sending data to the FSI RX would need to be able to communicate using the FSI protocol, which is only possible with another device that has FSI (or SPI). FSI was designed for communication between 2 MCUs. If the device you are using to transmit to the FSI RX has a SPI module, the FSI module can receive SPI data by using the SPI compatibility mode (the regular SPI module could also alternatively be used to receive in this case.)

Do the interfaces with the BEL System, BARCO Monitor, Range Controller and Vehicle Controller need to be full duplex (does data need to be both transmitted and received by the C2000 device or just transmitted or received)? If possible, I would suggest using each channel for a combination of interfaces (ex. SCIA TX for communication F2838x-> Vehicle Controller and SCIARX for communication BARCO Monitor->F2838x).

If this is not possible, I would suggest checking if a different communication peripheral (ex. SPI or I2C) can be used for 2 of the interfaces. Or one of the interfaces if you switch to the F28p65x.

MohanaSundari Sivakumar said:

Pl clarify , is there any application note to understand the performance computation of the overall dual core in case of utilizing this many serial channels.

I don't know of any application note discussing this. There shouldn't be a slower performance attributed to using all of the available channels at once since they use different resources in hardware. Software-wise, if you are planning to use interrupts for each SCI channel, the issue discussed in the first response of this thread may be more likely to take place since interrupts would be firing more frequently. To avoid this, I would recommend keeping the ISRs as short as possible and doing any data processing steps outside of the ISRs. 

Hopefully that makes sense, let me know if you have any more questions. 

Best Regards,

Delaney

MohanaSundari Sivakumar said:

Can I use USB of the TMS 320F28384D chip for this purpose?

I'm not sure about the full intended purpose, but if you're trying to connect with USB then yes, the USB peripheral should work. You can look at the USB chapter in the reference manual for specific features/configurations that you need to set. If you have any specific questions, let me know.