Q: I'm looking for an SPI bus monitoring solution and I have a specific hardware set up. My hardware set up requires the monitoring of an SPI shared bus with 2 chip select signals.

Does Total Phase provide any tools for SPI testing and/or monitoring an SPI bus? Furthermore, do you have any suggestions on how to apply your SPI bus monitor to fit these requirements?

A: Thanks for your question! Many firms have a requirement to test SPI buses. To meet your needs, Total Phase does provide an SPI bus monitor (also known as an SPI analyzer) called the Beagle I2C/SPI Protocol Analyzer.

The Beagle I2C/SPI Protocol Analyzer non-intrusively monitors and displays I2C and SPI data in real time. This analyzer uses our highly acclaimed Data Center software to provide the simplest, powerful SPI interface for analysis. Along with bit level timing down to a 20 ns resolution, the Beagle has a sampling rate of 50 MHz, which enables SPI monitoring to speeds of up to 24MHz.

The Beagle I2C/SPI Protocol Analyzer non-intrusively monitors I2C and SPI data in real time.

You mentioned that your SPI shared bus has 2 chip select signals. The Beagle I2C/SPI analyzer has one slave select (SS) input, and can monitor one SPI bus with each analyzer. To fulfill your hardware set up requirements, two Beagle I2C/SPI Protocol Analyzers will be able to monitor the two chip select signals.

Visualizing your captured data is easy - simply open two instances of the powerful Data Center Software. Each Beagle I2C/SPI Protocol Analyzer includes the unlimited license to use Data Center; therefore, you won’t incur incremental costs for additional software. Total Phase’s Data Center Software is a core component of our analysis suite. When used in conjunction with the Beagle I2C/SPI analyzer, Data Center captures and displays I2C bus and SPI bus data instantly, enabling you to interactively debug your SPI bus. Alternatively, you can take advantage of our royalty-free API to debug in the application of your choice. You can download the Data Center Software here.

We hope this answers your question! If you have any questions, feel free to email us at sales@totalphase.com or support@totalphase.com.