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TRF7970A: Issues with firmware connecting to microcontroller over SPI

Part Number: TRF7970A
Other Parts Discussed in Thread: DLP-7970ABP,

Having difficulty getting the sensor to read out to ESP & arduino. Looking for help devising a work around.

  • Hello Customer, thank you for your question and interest in our products.

    The forum support of this product has been reduced to first reference our existing documentation and collateral. TI does not have plans to stop production or place the device into a “Not Recommended for New Design” status, we genuinely feel most questions on these devices can be answered by reviewing existing collateral and previous questions asked. Please feel free to continue to use this device as you see fit for your applications. For support, please take a look to the “Similar Topics” section at the lower right of the thread page. In addition, please consult the existing collateral in the “Technical Documentation” section of the TRF7970A product web page along with the Frequently Asked Question document. Alternatively, you can use the search engine of your choice to look for related E2E threads. With each of these resources we believe it will help with your question.

  • There's not enough information in the technical documentation. Looking for some actual technical advice from TI. Happy to share code or more details if ane employee would like to look through them. Thanks

  • Hello JN,

    there is not enough information in your question to narrow down the problem.

    Could you please provide details on

    • board type (DLP-7970ABP or customized board)
    • controller type (MSP430 or other)
    • sensor tag to read out

    Code reviews are beyond the scope of this forum support. But the referenced collateral provides some example code for reference.

    Best regards,

    Andreas.

  • I have both the DLP-7970ABP and a customized board we've tested with and ran into the same issue. 

    Controller is an ESP32 S3 and for debugging Arduino Uno = ATMEGA328P

    We are using an RFID tag 14443 3A to read out

    The sensor tag keeps reading out "Failed to connect" but does show power 

    However, on the Arduino it is connecting with our code but not reading back the correct ID from the tag. No idea why

  • I have both the DLP-7970ABP and a customized board we've tested with and ran into the same issue. 

    Controller is an ESP32 S3 and for debugging Arduino Uno = ATMEGA328P

    We are using an RFID tag 14443 3A to read out

    The sensor tag keeps reading out "Failed to connect" but does show power 

    However, on the Arduino it is connecting with our code but not reading back the correct ID from the tag. No idea why

  • Update. We have the DLP-7970ABP connecting to the ESP32-S3. It had to do with clock speed. 

    We still have yet to read out the correct value placed on a tag 14443 3A however.

  • Hello JN,

    Is your setup able to communicate to the DLP-7970ABP via SPI? Means, can you write and read register values?

    Is your DLP-7970ABP setup able to read other tags, for example a ISO15693 tag?

    If not, then I would suggest to take a look at our example code for MSP430 Launchpads (see chapter 1.3 in the FAQ document). This might help to analyze and compare the startup sequence, register settings and the handling of sending and receiving data through the TRF7970A. You could also purchase one of the example Launchpads and monitor the SPI interface of the TRF7970A with a logic analyzer. This way you could compare the timing of the individual commands with your setup.

    I would focus on getting the DLP-7970ABP setup working first, to have a reference setup. In the next step I would switch to the customized TRF7970A board and see if it is still working.

    Best regards,

    Andreas.