DCA1000EVM: IWR6843ISK + DCA1000EVM : How to parse data in data separated mode using MIMO (2 Tx + 4 Rx)

Thibaud H.

Part Number: DCA1000EVM
Other Parts Discussed in Thread: IWR6843ISK

Hi all,

I'm trying to parse raw data from the IWR6843ISK radar using the DCA1000EVM in order to display heatmap on Matlab.

I successfully parsed the .bin generated by the DCA1000EVM_CLI_Control utility, but only in raw mode (no header, "dataLoggingMode": "raw"). I'm also able to display heatmap in real-time, reading the UDP packets when DCA1000 is configured in raw mode.

However, when I try to do the same in multi mode (data separated mode in DCA1000 JSON config file, "dataLoggingMode": "multi"), I can separate each frame on magic word 0x0CDA0ADC0CDA0ADCU but I can't figure how to seperate data for each Rx channel.

I followed instructions on chirp configuration:

chirpCfg 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1

chirpCfg 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 4

frameCfg 0 1 16 0 100 1 0

From the mmWave SDK documentation, it is possible to parse data for Rx0 channel, but nothing is mentioned for the MIMO case (Rx0 to Rx4):

So my questions are:

Is it possible to parse MIMO data in header (multi) mode ? Or only in raw mode ? If yes, where could I find instructions or code example to do so?
If not, how to be sure a frame is complete in Raw mode, and how to dissociate each frame from one another?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Best,

Thibaud

over 2 years ago

0 Pedrhom Nafisi over 2 years ago

TI__Mastermind 23177 points

Hello Thibaud,

Just to confirm, have you seen all the documentation on multi mode data logging which can be found in the DCA1000 CLI guide?

/cfs-file/__key/communityserver-discussions-components-files/1023/TI_5F00_DCA1000EVM_5F00_CLI_5F00_Software_5F00_UserGuide.pdf

Best Regards,

Pedrhom

0 Thibaud H. over 2 years ago in reply to Pedrhom Nafisi

Prodigy 10 points

Hi Pedrhom,

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, I had several looks at both CLI Developer and User Guides, but it's still unclear whether MIMO parsing is possible in multi mode.

It seems that I'm limited to a 2048 bytes data stream, when I'm checking packet size on Wireshark. However, if I'm using all azimuth antennas (4Tx + 2 Rx), so 8 MIMO antennas, with 256 points per chirp, complex mode, and 16 chirp per frame, it would require a transfer of 256 (ADC Samples) x 2 (IQ) x 8 (antennas) x 1 (chirp loop) = 4096 bytes.

I found on the mmWave SDK User Guide that "for the current implementation of the CBUFF/LVDS driver, the CBUFF data size for a given session needs to be multiple of 8". But this is the case with my config right?

0 Pedrhom Nafisi over 2 years ago in reply to Thibaud H.

TI__Mastermind 23177 points

Hello,

Please check the script attached for example code on MIMO usage.

https://e2e.ti.com/cfs-file/__key/communityserver-discussions-components-files/1023/DataProcessMIMO_5F00_pointCloud.m

Best Regards,

Pedrhom

0 Thibaud H. over 2 years ago in reply to Pedrhom Nafisi

Prodigy 10 points

Thanks for the reference script.

What I forgot to mention is that I'm trying to parse the UDP frames on real-time. I don't have trouble parsing the .bin file, but I have issues getting the correct UDP frames.

0 Pedrhom Nafisi over 2 years ago in reply to Thibaud H.

TI__Mastermind 23177 points

Hello,

The DCA1000 is unable to do real-time processing.

https://e2e.ti.com/support/sensors-group/sensors/f/sensors-forum/968875/dca1000evm-extract-real-time-data-to-linux

Best Regards,

Pedrhom

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DCA1000EVM: IWR6843ISK + DCA1000EVM : How to parse data in data separated mode using MIMO (2 Tx + 4 Rx)