1 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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5 This README contains various notes for users of libsigrok (or frontends
6 that are based on libsigrok) about device- and/or driver-specific issues.
12 Some devices supported by libsigrok need a firmware to be uploaded every time
13 the device is connected to the PC (usually via USB), before it can be used.
15 The default locations where libsigrok expects the firmware files are:
17 $SIGROK_FIRMWARE_DIR (environment variable)
18 $HOME/.local/share/sigrok-firmware
19 $prefix/share/sigrok-firmware
20 /usr/local/share/sigrok-firmware
21 /usr/share/sigrok-firmware
23 ($prefix is usually /usr/local or /usr, depending on your ./configure options)
25 For further information see the section below and also:
27 http://sigrok.org/wiki/Firmware
30 Per-driver firmware requirements
31 --------------------------------
33 The following drivers/devices require a firmware upload upon connection:
35 - asix-sigma: The ASIX SIGMA and SIGMA2 require various firmware files,
36 depending on the settings used. These files are available from our
37 'sigrok-firmware' repository/project under a license which allows us
40 - fx2lafw: Logic analyzers based on the Cypress FX2(LP) chip need the
41 firmware files from the 'sigrok-firmware-fx2lafw' repository/project.
42 The firmware is written from scratch and licensed under the GNU GPLv2+.
44 - hantek-6xxx: Certain oscilloscopes based on the Cypress FX2(LP) chip, such
45 as the Hantek 6022BE/6022BL, SainSmart DDS120, and Rocktech BM102, need the
46 firmware files from the 'sigrok-firmware-fx2lafw' repository/project.
47 The firmware is written from scratch and licensed under the GNU GPLv2+.
49 - hantek-dso: The Hantek DSO-2090 (and other supported models of the same
50 series of Hantek PC oscilloscopes) need firmware files.
51 These can be extracted from the vendor's Windows drivers using a tool
52 from our 'sigrok-util' repository/project.
54 - lecroy-logicstudio: The LeCroy LogicStudio requires FPGA bitstream files.
55 These can be extracted from the vendor's Windows software using a tool
56 from our 'sigrok-util' repository/project.
57 Additionally, it requires a Cypress FX2 firmware. This can be extracted
58 from the vendor's Windows software using another tool. Details:
60 http://sigrok.org/wiki/LeCroy_LogicStudio#Firmware
62 - saleae-logic16: The Saleae Logic16 needs a firmware file for the
63 Cypress FX2 chip in the device, as well as two FPGA bitstream files.
64 These can be extracted from the vendor's Linux application using a tool
65 from our 'sigrok-util' repository/project.
69 - The Sysclk LWLA1034 requires various bitstream files.
70 These files are available from our 'sigrok-firmware' repository/project
71 under a license which allows us to redistribute them.
73 - The Sysclk LWLA1016 requires various bitstream files.
74 These can be extracted from the vendor's Windows drivers using a tool
75 from our 'sigrok-util' repository/project.
77 The following drivers/devices do not need any firmware upload:
81 - arachnid-labs-re-load-pro
88 - center-3xx (including all subdrivers)
95 - gmc-mh-1x-2x (including all subdrivers)
100 - ikalogic-scanalogic2
108 - mic-985xx (including all subdrivers)
111 - openbench-logic-sniffer
116 - serial-dmm (including all subdrivers)
117 - serial-lcr (including all subdrivers)
122 - uni-t-dmm (including all subdrivers)
126 - zeroplus-logic-cube
129 Specifying serial ports
130 -----------------------
132 Many devices supported by libsigrok use serial port based cables (real RS232
133 or USB-to-serial ones, CDC class) to connect to a PC. These serial cables are
134 supported by the libserialport library. Some vendors prefer to use HID chips
135 instead of CDC chips in their serial cables. These cables can get supported
136 by means of the hidapi library. Note that each chip type requires specific
137 support in the libsigrok library. Bluetooth connected devices may be supported
138 as well when they communicate by means of RFCOMM channels, or one of the
139 implemented BLE notification/indication approaches, and one of the Bluetooth
140 supporting platforms is used.
142 For all these devices, you need to specify the serial port they are connected
143 to (e.g. using the 'conn' option in sigrok-cli). It is not possible to scan
144 for such devices without specifying a serial port.
148 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=/dev/ttyUSB0 ...
149 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=hid/cp2110 ...
150 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=bt/rfcomm/01-23-45-67-89-ab ...
152 Formal syntax for serial communication:
154 - COM ports (RS232, USB CDC):
158 conn=hid[/<chip>]/usb=<bus>.<dev>[.<if>]
159 conn=hid[/<chip>]/raw=<path>
160 conn=hid[/<chip>]/sn=<serno>
161 chip can be: ch9325, cp2110
162 path may contain slashes
163 path and serno are "greedy" (span to the end of the spec)
164 - Bluetooth Classic and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE):
165 conn=bt/<conn>/<addr>
166 conn can be: rfcomm, ble122, nrf51, cc254x
167 addr can be "dense" or separated, bt/cc254x/0123456789ab or
168 bt/rfcomm/11-22-33-44-55-66 or bt/ble122/88:6b:12:34:56:78
169 (note that colons may not be available when the conn= spec is taken
170 from a string that separates fields by colon, e.g. in the "--driver
171 <name>:conn=<spec>" example, that is why the dense form and the use
172 of dashes for separation are supported)
174 The following drivers/devices require a serial port specification. Some of
175 the drivers implement a default for the connection. Some of the drivers
176 can auto-detect USB connected devices.
183 - center-3xx (including all subdrivers)
187 - gmc-mh-1x-2x (including all subdrivers)
190 - mic-985xx (including all subdrivers)
192 - openbench-logic-sniffer
193 - rigol-ds (for RS232; not required for USBTMC or TCP)
194 - serial-dmm (including all subdrivers)
195 - serial-lcr (including all subdrivers)
198 - uni-t-dmm (all -ser subdrivers)
201 The following drivers/devices do not require a serial port specification:
209 - ikalogic-scanalogic2
214 - rigol-ds (USBTMC or TCP)
217 - uni-t-dmm (all non -ser subdrivers)
218 - yokogawa-dlm (USBTMC or TCP)
219 - zeroplus-logic-cube
221 Beyond strict serial communication over COM ports (discussed above), the
222 conn= property can also address specific USB devices, as well as specify TCP
223 or VXI communication parameters. See these examples:
225 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=<vid>.<pid> ...
226 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=tcp-raw/<ipaddr>/<port> ...
227 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=vxi/<ipaddr> ...
228 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=usbtmc/<bus>.<addr> ...
230 The following drivers/devices accept network communication parameters:
239 Specifying serial port parameters
240 ---------------------------------
242 Every serial device's driver has default serial port parameters like baud
243 rate, number of data bits, stop bits and handshake status. If a device requires
244 different parameters, pass them as option "serialcomm" with the driver name.
245 See libsigrok docs for the function serial_set_paramstr() for complete specs.
249 $ sigrok-cli --driver <somedriver>:conn=<someconn>:serialcomm=9600/7n1/dtr=1
252 Permissions of serial port based devices
253 ----------------------------------------
255 When using devices supported by libsigrok that use serial port based cables
256 (real RS232 or USB-to-serial ones) to connect to a PC, you need to ensure
257 that the user running the libsigrok frontend has (read/write) permissions to
258 access the serial port device (e.g. /dev/ttyS0, /dev/ttyUSB0, and so on).
260 You can use 'chmod' to apply permissions as you see fit, and/or 'chown' to
261 change the owner of the serial port device to a certain user or group.
263 For USB-to-serial based devices, we recommended using our udev rules file
264 (see below for details).
267 Permissions for USB devices (udev rules files)
268 ----------------------------------------------
270 When using USB-based devices supported by libsigrok, the user running the
271 libsigrok frontend (e.g. sigrok-cli) has to have (read/write) permissions
272 for the respective USB device.
274 On Linux, this is accomplished using udev rules. libsigrok ships a rules
275 file containing all supported devices which can be detected reliably
276 (generic USB-to-serial converters are omitted, as these are used for a wide
277 range of devices, e.g. GPS receivers, which are not handled by libsigrok).
279 The file is available in contrib/60-libsigrok.rules. This file just contains
280 the list of devices and flags these devices with ID_SIGROK="1". Access is
281 granted by the 61-libsigrok-plugdev.rules or 61-libsigrok-uaccess.rules files,
282 allowing access to members of the plugdev group or to currently logged in
285 When using a libsigrok package from your favorite Linux distribution, the
286 files should already be installed in /usr/lib/udev/rules.d/, i.e.
287 60-libsigrok.rules and one of the access granting rules files. Use of
288 61-libsigrok-uaccess.rules is encouraged on systemd distributions.
290 The access policy can be locally overridden by placing appropriate rules in
291 /etc/udev/rules.d/, disabling or ammending the default policy. See the
292 udev documentation, e.g. man 7 udev, for details.
294 If you're building from source, you need to copy the file to the place
295 where udev will read these rules. Local rules should go to /etc/udev/rules.d.
296 Keep the file naming, otherwise interaction between the libsigrok rules and
297 rules shipped by the system will be broken.
299 Please consult the udev docs for details.
302 Cypress FX2 based devices
303 -------------------------
305 Devices using the Cypress FX2(LP) chip without any specific USB VID/PID will
306 be enumerated with VID/PID 04b4:8613 (the default for "unconfigured FX2").
307 These are usually "FX2 eval boards" (that can also be used as LAs, though).
309 On Linux, the 'usbtest' driver will usually grab such devices, and they will
310 thus not be usable by libsigrok (and frontends).
312 You can fix this by running 'rmmod usbtest' as root before using the device.
315 UNI-T DMM (and rebranded models) cables
316 ---------------------------------------
318 UNI-T multimeters (and rebranded devices, e.g. some Voltcraft models) can
319 ship with different PC connectivity cables:
321 - UT-D02 (RS232 cable)
322 - UT-D04 (USB/HID cable with Hoitek HE2325U chip, USB VID/PID 04fa:2490)
323 - UT-D04 (USB/HID cable with WCH CH9325 chip, USB VID/PID 1a86:e008)
324 - UT-D07 (Bluetooth adapter, ISSC BL79 BLETR chip)
325 - UT-D09 (USB/HID cable with SiL CP2110 chip, USB VID/PID 10c4:ea80)
327 The above cables are all physically compatible (same IR connector shape)
328 with all/most currently known UNI-T multimeters. For example, you can
329 use either of the UT-D04 USB/HID cables or the UT-D02 RS232 cable with
330 the UNI-T UT61D multimeter.
332 When using the UT-D02 RS232 cable with any of the supported UNI-T DMMs,
333 you have to use the respective driver with a '-ser' drivername suffix
334 (internally all of these models are handled by the 'serial-dmm' driver).
336 You also need to specify the serial port via the 'conn' option, e.g.
337 /dev/ttyUSB0 (attached via a USB-to-serial cable) or /dev/ttyS0 (actual
338 RS232 port) on Linux (see above).
340 Finally, the user running the frontend (e.g. sigrok-cli) also needs
341 permissions to access the respective serial port (see above).
343 Examples (sigrok-cli):
345 $ sigrok-cli --driver uni-t-ut61e-ser:conn=/dev/ttyUSB0 ...
346 $ sigrok-cli --driver voltcraft-vc820-ser:conn=/dev/ttyS0 ...
348 When using any of the UT-D04 USB/HID cables you have to use the respective
349 driver _without_ the '-ser' drivername suffix (internally all of these models
350 are handled by the 'uni-t-dmm' driver).
352 You also need to specify the USB vendor/device IDs of the cable.
353 Autodetection is not possible here, since various other products use the
354 USB VID/PID of those cables too, and there is no way to distinguish them.
356 Since the UT-D04 cables are USB based (but don't use a USB-to-serial chip)
357 there is no need to specify a serial port via 'conn', of course.
358 However, the user running the frontend does also need to have permissions
359 to access the respective USB device (see above).
361 Examples (sigrok-cli):
363 $ sigrok-cli --driver uni-t-ut61e:conn=1a86.e008 ...
364 $ sigrok-cli --driver voltcraft-vc820:conn=04fa.2490 ...
367 UNI-T UT-D04 cable issue on Linux
368 ---------------------------------
370 The UNI-T UT-D04 cable with Hoitek HE2325U (or WCH CH9325) chip seems to have
371 a very specific problem on Linux. Apparently it requires to be put into
372 suspend (and woken up again) before it is usable. This seems to be a
373 Linux-only issue, Windows is not affected by this since apparently the
374 Windows kernel does this for every USB device, always.
376 Thus, if you want to use any of the UNI-T DMMs with this specific cable,
377 you'll have to run the following script (as root) once, every time you attach
378 the cable via USB. The script was written by Ralf Burger.
380 See also: http://erste.de/UT61/index.html
383 for dat in /sys/bus/usb/devices/*; do
384 if test -e $dat/manufacturer; then
385 grep "WCH.CN" $dat/manufacturer > /dev/null && echo auto > ${dat}/power/level && echo 0 > ${dat}/power/autosuspend
390 Enabling multimeter / data logger measurement output
391 ----------------------------------------------------
393 Some multimeters or data loggers will not start outputting measurement data
394 unless a certain action has been performed by the user beforehand. This is
395 usually mentioned in the vendor manual of the respective device, but here's
396 a short list for convenience:
398 - BBC Goertz Metrawatt M2110: Briefly press the "Start/Reset" button on the
399 interface panel on top.
400 - Brymen BM257s: Press HOLD during power-on.
401 - Digitek DT4000ZC: Briefly press the "RS232" button.
402 - EEVBlog 121GW: Hold "1ms PEAK" until the "BT" indicator is shown.
403 - ES51919 based LCR meters (DER EE DE-5000, PeakTech 2170, UNI-T UT612):
404 Press the button with the "RS232" or "USB" or "PC link" label (usually
405 the "up" cursor button).
406 - Gossen Metrawatt Metrahit 1x/2x devices, driver gmc-mh-1x-2x-rs232:
407 - Power on the device with the "DATA" button pressed.
408 - Metrahit 2x devices must be configured for the respective interface type.
409 - Gossen Metrawatt Metrahit 2x devices, driver gmc-mh-2x-bd232:
411 The multimeter must be configured for the respective interface type.
412 - 'SI232-II' interface ("PC Mode"):
413 The multimeter must be configured for interface type 'BD232' (all),
414 'SI232 online' (28-29S) or 'SI232 store' (22-26x). The interface must
415 be configured to the same baud rate as the host (default 9600).
416 Multimeter and interface must be configured to the same address.
417 - Metrix MX56C: Press the PRINT button to have the meter send acquisition
418 data via IR. Hold the PRINT button to adjust the meter's transmission
420 - Norma DM950: If the interface doesn't work (e.g. USB-RS232 converter), power
421 on the device with "FUNC" pressed (to power the interface from the DMM).
422 - PCE PCE-DM32: Briefly press the "RS232" button.
423 - RadioShack 22-812: Press and hold "SELECT" and "RANGE" together.
424 - TekPower TP4000ZC: Briefly press the "RS232" button.
425 - Tenma 72-7750: Briefly press the "RS232C" button.
426 - UNI-T UT60G: Briefly press the "RS232C" button.
427 - UNI-T UT61B/C/D: Press the "REL/RS232/USB" button for roughly 1 second.
428 - UNI-T UT71x: Press the "SEND/-/MAXMIN" button for roughly 1 second.
429 Briefly pressing the "EXIT" button leaves this mode again.
430 - UNI-T UT325: Briefly press the "SEND" button (as per manual). However, it
431 appears that in practice you don't have to press the button (at least on
432 some versions of the device), simply connect the device via USB.
433 - V&A VA18B/VA40B: Keep the "Hz/DUTY" key pressed while powering on the DMM.
434 - Victor 70C/86C: Press the "REL/RS232" button for roughly 1 second.
435 - Voltcraft VC-830: Press the "REL/PC" button for roughly 2 seconds.
436 - Voltcraft VC-870: Press the "REL/PC" button for roughly 1 second.
439 ChronoVu LA8/LA16 USB VID/PIDs
440 ------------------------------
442 The ChronoVu LA8/LA16 logic analyzer is available in two revisions. Previously,
443 the device shipped with a USB VID/PID of 0403:6001, which is the standard ID
444 for FTDI FT232 USB chips.
446 Since this made it hard to distinguish the LA8/LA16 from any other device
447 with this FTDI chip connected to the PC, the vendor later shipped the
448 device with a USB VID/PID of 0403:8867.
450 The 'chronovu-la' driver in libsigrok supports both VID/PID pairs and
451 automatically finds devices with either VID/PID pair.
457 The Dangerous Prototypes Openbench Logic Sniffer (OLS) logic analyzer
458 driver in libsigrok assumes a somewhat recent firmware has been flashed onto
459 the OLS (it doesn't need a firmware upload every time it's attached via USB,
460 since the firmware is stored in the device permanently).
462 The most recent firmware version that is tested is 3.07.
464 If you use any older firmware and your OLS is not found or is not working
465 properly, please upgrade to at least this firmware version. Check the
466 Dangerous Prototypes wiki for firmware upgrade instructions:
468 http://dangerousprototypes.com/docs/Logic_Sniffer_upgrade_procedure
470 Also, you need to specify a serial port for the OLS in the frontends, e.g.
471 using the 'conn' option in sigrok-cli, and you also need to have the
472 permissions to access the serial port (see above).
476 $ sigrok-cli --driver ols:conn=/dev/ttyACM0 ...