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AWR1243BOOST: Connecting multiple boards to one PC

Koichiro Tashiro
Mastermind 22070 points
Part Number: AWR1243BOOST
Other Parts Discussed in Thread: DCA1000EVM, AWR1243

Hi,

Is it possible to connect multiple AWR1243BOOST boards to one PC?

My customer is planning to use a several AWR1243BOOST in parallel and control these boards with one PC.
He wants to get IF data from each board with time division multiplex manner.
Each AWR is controlled by commands sent by COM port.
The data are captured by capture board (DCA1000EVM or similar board).
 
The question is whether the PC can send commands to a specific board among a several boards connected to the COM port
If not, I guess the number of AWR1243BOOST will be limited by the number of COM ports the PC has.

Thanks and regards,
Koichiro Tashiro

  • 0
    TI__Guru 69480 points

    Hi Koichiro San,

    How do you control AWR1243 from PC? If it is via mmWave Studio then this tool can support only device connection and you can open only one instance of mmwave Studio on the PC. Thus from a PC you can control only one AWR1243 EVM.

    Multiple AWR1243 can be connected to some kind of external hardware (embedded processor/MCU) where it can have multiple SPI interface to connect each of AWR1243 EVM individually and then from PC you can send command to this MCU to control AWR device. And for data path (ADC data) this MCU should have capability to capture the data from multiple device over LVDS/CSI-2.

    DCA1000EVM can capture LVDS data from single device.

    Regards,

    Jitendra

  • 0 in reply to Jitendra Gupta
    TI__Mastermind 22070 points

    Hi Jitendra,

    Thanks for your quick reply!

    Customer plans to use their own software (Matlab or something) running on the PC.
    So the PC can send commands on flexible basis, but I am not sure AWR1243 side can determine which command is mine and which command is others in case multiple AWR is connected to one COM port.
    If it is not possible, one AWR needs to connect one COM port. The number of AWR is limited to the number of COM port the PC has.

    For data capture, I understood DCA1000EVM can capture only one device.
    So multiple DCA EVMs are also needed, correct?

    Jitendra Gupta said:
    Multiple AWR1243 can be connected to some kind of external hardware (embedded processor/MCU) where it can have multiple SPI interface to connect each of AWR1243 EVM individually and then from PC you can send command to this MCU to control AWR device. And for data path (ADC data) this MCU should have capability to capture the data from multiple device over LVDS/CSI-2.


    I think this is exactly the cascading environment and this is what customer really wants.
    But the cascading EVM is not yet available for customer, so my customer is looking for alternate solution for near future.

    Thanks and regards,
    Koichiro Tashiro

  • 0 in reply to Koichiro Tashiro
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Koichiro San,

    When you connect multiple AWR1243BOOST to the PC each of them will enumerate with different COM port numbers. So the PC application can communicate to each of the using different COM port numbers.

    Regards,

    Vivek

  • 0 in reply to Vivek Dham
    TI__Mastermind 22070 points

    Hi Vivek,

    Thanks for your input!

    Vivek Dham said:

    When you connect multiple AWR1243BOOST to the PC each of them will enumerate with different COM port numbers. So the PC application can communicate to each of the using different COM port numbers.



    I understood this is true even if the PC has only one USB port and multiple AWR1243BOOST are connected via USB Hub.
    Correct?

    Thanks and regards,
    Koichiro Tashiro

  • 0 in reply to Koichiro Tashiro
    TI__Mastermind 22070 points

    Hi, Jitendra,

    > DCA1000EVM can capture LVDS data from single device.

    Is it possible to connect multiple DCA1000EVM boards to one PC and get data from each board?

    Thanks and regards,
    Koichiro Tashiro

  • 0 in reply to Koichiro Tashiro
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Koichiro San,

    Presently the DCA1000 has a fixed IP address, so you cannot communicate to multiple DCA1000 boards from the same PC since the IP address is the same.

    Regards,
    vivek

  • 0 in reply to Vivek Dham
    TI__Mastermind 22070 points

    Hi Vivek,

    The IP address cannot be changed by any means?

    Thanks and regards,
    Koichiro Tashiro

  • 0 in reply to Koichiro Tashiro
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Koichiro San,

    There is not direct way from mmwave studio GUI, but we do have a .dll which provides this function and you can write your own code to call this function. In the mmwave studio package you can find the "rf_api.h" file that shows the "CONFIG_EEPROM_CMD_CODE" command which can be used to update the IP address.

    regards,

    vivek 

  • 0 in reply to Vivek Dham
    Intellectual 280 points

    Hi Vivek,

    We tried connecting multiple AWR1234BOOST boards on DCA1000s to the same PC via a USB hub. We're able to see that the COM ports are enumerated separately. However, we're not able to use the included example code mmw_example.c in the ti\mmwave_dfp_01_02_00_01\ti\example\mmwavelink_example folder to communicate with both the AWR1234BOOST at the same time. 

    Have created a post here: https://e2e.ti.com/support/sensors/f/1023/t/847172 to ask for help. Appreciate it!

    Regards,

    Siyuan

  • 0 in reply to Siyuan Zhu
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Siyuan,

    The DFP example code will not work with multiple devices connected to the same PC. It can communicate to a single FTDI chip.

    Regards,
    vivek

  • 0 in reply to Vivek Dham
    Intellectual 280 points

    Hi Vivek:

    Thanks for clarification.

    I have a further question:

    Now I'm clear that the example codes do not work with two devices, but is there any codes in library related to differentiating and selecting different SPI?

    It seems like there are related codes in librf.dll contained in ti\mmwave_dfp_01_02_00_01\ti\example\mmwavelink_example folder, is this the case? Or can you inform me where can I look for codes about differentiating and selecting of SPI to control multiple radars on one pc?

    Regards,

    Siyuan

  • 0 in reply to Siyuan Zhu
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Siyuan,

    The first thing is you cannot differentiate between the FTDI chips unless you have separate IDs for each FTDI. Presently the FTDIs on all the EVMs have the same ID. If you can modify the IDs to be different then you can write some code to communicate to each of them separately.

    Regards,

    vivek

  • 0 in reply to Vivek Dham
    Prodigy 180 points

    Hi Vivek,

    So if we change the ID of the FTDI chips somehow, then can we establish two separate SPI connections from the same PCs. Is this consistent with the answer in this record: (https://e2e.ti.com/support/sensors/f/1023/t/847172?tisearch=e2e-sitesearch&keymatch=%20user%3A412494) ?

    Best,

    Kshitiz

  • 0 in reply to Kshitiz Bansal
    TI__Guru 58035 points

    Hello Kshitiz,

    That is correct, you could differential between the SPIs if you had unique FTDI IDs for the boards. You would appropriately need to develop the driver to communicate with that particular FTDI ID.

    Regards,
    Vivek