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Seeking Your Feedback: Which Ethernet Eval Board would You Prefer Roadtesting?

rscasny

Hi All.

I've had a conversation with a sponsor regarding two of its Ethernet evaluation boards. I'm at the point of the conversation where I wanted to get some community input on these boards. Let me described them below with some key features and links to documentation. I have a poll to follow the information.

Here's the first kit being considered for a roadtest:

imageLow Complexity, 2-Port Ethernet Switch with Integrated 10BASE-T1L PHYs (EVAL-ADIN2111)
It's a flexible platform enabling quick evaluation of the ADIN2111, robust, low power 10BASE-T1L 2-Port Ethernet switch. The evaluation board provides 2 10BASE-T1L channels with 10Mbit per second Single Pair Ethernet (SPE) connections reaching up to 1.7km of link distance. The ADIN2111 internal switch can be configured in store and forward mode between the two 10BASE-T1L channels and the SPI host. Cut through mode is also available between Port 1 and Port 2 and can be used without the need of the SPI host (unmanaged configuration).

The evaluation board offers two modes of operation for maximum flexibility: Connected to a PC via USB port, the full set of ADIN2111 register settings and features such as link quality monitoring and diagnostics can be accessed over the USB using the serial command interface implemented in the evaluation firmware.

Alternatively, the board can operate in cut-through mode between Port 1 and Port 2 (unmanaged configuration without firmware) where the EVAL-ADIN2111EBZ acts as a network switch forwarding packets between the 2x 10BASE-T1L ports. The 2x links are configured by setting the ADIN2111 hardware configuration pins jumper and switches. The 2x On-board Activity LEDs provide Link activity status indication for each port.

Features

  • User friendly access to all ADIN2111 features
  • Stand-alone hardware configured operation
  • On-board ARM Cortex-M4 STM32L4S5QII3P ultra-low-power Microcontroller
  • Custom firmware can also be developed and the ADIN2111 driver support package includes simple project examples to start a custom implementation.
  • SPI interface provides access to the management registers required for the switch configuration, the 2 PHYs configuration and data exchange between SPI host and ports.

Documents


Here's the 2nd eval board:

imageMultiprotocol Two-Port Industrial Ethernet Platform (ADIN2299)

The EV-RPG2 evaluation kits provide an end to end evaluation of the communication path from the host processor to the programmable logic controller (PLC) or PC-based tool. It can completely verify the communication path between the host processor and a PLC before integrating the network interface into the end field device.

The RapID Platform Generation 2 (RPG2) ADIN2299 is a network interface solution that enables connectivity to devices that do not have this capability. The ADIN2299 supports multiple industrial Ethernet protocols with the same host processor software platform. The user simply interfaces with the ADIN2299 over a universal asynchronous receiver transmitter (UART) interface, a serial peripheral interface (SPI), or an Ethernet interface (raw socket connections with no need for a TCP/IP stack).

Eval Kit Options

  • EtherCAT: EV-RPG2-ECZ
  • EtherNet/IP: EV-RPG2-ENZ
  • Profinet: EV-RPG2-PNZ
  • Modbus: EV-RPG2-MBZ

Documentation

Polls



  • I would be interested if and when I think of an appropriate application. I've just started to consider what I might use this for.

  • With the first option you missed highlighting this key feature... that is, it can be configured as a daisy-chain, or ring network topology. IMO, makes it very useful in industrial settings.

    EDIT. As such, it may require 2 boards to properly evaluate.

  • I have not worked with SPE yet, I would like to test any of the above product. But I can't think of any use case where the product can be used for personal or domestic purposes.

  • in reply to BigG

    Exactly, these are some medium range industrial communication products. Either we have to use our office setup or get a compatible end device to hook with.

  • I'm still struggling to see much point in single pair Ethernet - it's slow but not cheap.

    The KSZ8863 is a three port dual phi 10/100 managed switch at less than half the price of the ADIN 211 and uses standard Ethernet cables. It can't reach 1.7km but how often does one need to ?

    But a 10/100 switch will plug into pretty much any computer, which is a huge advantage.

    MK

  • in reply to michaelkellett

    in my opinion it is for industry to replace other serial interfaces - this way, in one standard ethernet cable one can put four links, that can be then connected to the LAN (without any modbus gateways and the like).

    Coupled with POE, there is a possibility to install four unpowered modules in a remote site without any additional hardware (POE in/POE out switch?) that can be useful in a factory or - for example - agricultural building - or even for surveillance if using 100Mb/s SPE and POE cameras. And with 1km distance, possibility to run one cable instead of four is a great improvement.

    BTW/ For some time I am thinking about building media converter from Ethernet to SPE - it seems that PHYs can be connected back-to-back using RMII, only with small MCU for configuration - and PHYs are not very expensive in comparison to switches (10Mb/s SPE PHY can be bought for several dollars/piece even for small orders) ...

  • in reply to michaelkellett

    I would agree. I have not seen much general chatter about SPE and I have seen one or two dev boards being discontinued. So I guess it is very much tailored to specific industries rather than being promoted for general use anywhere/everywhere. Maybe that's why it's not cheap.

    I've recently been using broadband powerline comms, and I'm pretty happy with it so far. At first glance, I would say that SPE could be a substitute for this communication protocol. Maybe I'll be proven wrong about that.

  • the second one seems interesting - mainly because, after reading description - I didn't have an idea what is it exactly.

    First I thought that it is some sort of network sniffer - but it turns out to be an multiprotocol network interface chip with protocol offload - communicating with main processor using unified interface disregarding the protocol currently configured on the line

    Difficult to test in my opinion - one would need some target devices supporting different industrial protocols. Maybe someone from Industrial Automation design challenge would be prepared?

    First one seems easier - but without two endpoints (as it is a switch, one usually needs two devices to communicate) any real testing seems difficult. Maybe getting link  parameters with one device attached? But it still requires one SPE device