December 16, 2008 - I2CXpress is a new, versatile USB2.0-connected I2C protocol exerciser/analyzer. Ideal for all I2C bus system development and debug, it operates on standard I2C protocol interfaces in low-speed (10 kbps), standard (100 kbps) and fast (400 kbps) modes. For advanced systems, Fast (>1 Mbps) mode is also supported. I2CXpress can be used as an I2C bus master as well as an analyzer.
USB-powered I2CXpress is provided with easy-to-use 8PI Control Panel software, with a visual PC interface to interact with embedded I²C systems. 8PI Control Panel is supplied with a TCL/tk scripting environment, giving access to a C/C++ DLL as well as the graphical interface. As an I²C master, I2CXpress allows communication with a network of I2C bus devices. It can address both 7-bit and 10-bit slaves, sending arbitrary length write and read data. It visually reports I2C bus events, such as missing acknowledge or bus arbitration loss.
As an I2C analyzer, I2CXpress oversamples the I2C bus, collects a selected number of raw data samples and isolates and decodes each I2C bus transaction. The collected data can be saved as decoded data, raw samples, and also a VCD file. Clock stretching and repeated start functions are supported, as is I2C-based flash memory access and multi-master capabilities.
I2CXpress is surprisingly compact at only 3.5" x 2" x 0.75" and less than 3oz. This compact, robust portable solution is an ideal I2C system development and debug field tool for any engineer's tool-kit.
Designed for chip-to-chip communication emulation at 3.3V LVTTL/LVCMOS, it can also operate at lower voltages. A plug-in board PLG-LCS-007 is available for accommodating higher I2C bus voltages (4.0 - 7.0V).
I2CXpress connects to any PC using Microsoft Windows XP or Vista operating systems, and is a hot Plug'n'Play device which can be attached and removed from the host computer without having to power-down or reboot. I2CXpress is fully bus- powered when the internal power supply mode is selected, and operates without needing any external power supply. I2CXpress is available from stock now at $699.00 each from Saelig Co. Inc.
Pittsford NY.
