Author Topic: Charlieplex quirk when plugged in to USB host?  (Read 2850 times)

pfriedel@gmail.com

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Charlieplex quirk when plugged in to USB host?
« on: February 11, 2013, 11:20:42 am »
So I ported my stock ATtiny game of life to the Digispark ( https://github.com/pfriedel/TinyLife with some changes to the led_dir and led_out definitions - it took me a bit to realize that P0-P5 are just the ATtiny port B lines. Convenient. ) and while it looks great while plugged in to a USB power supply, when it's plugged in to a USB host device (i.e. laptop USB port, USB hub, etc) the LED nearest P4 stays pretty dimly lit while the next one over flickers every now and then.  And while I hadn't tested it before now, it seems like it's making my USB root slightly unhappy - my keyboard is going offline every now and then.  Before I dig out a USB explorer, is it possible the charlieplex PWM is making just enough noise to my USB system that the host is resetting it out of a sheer sense of self preservation?  That is, the D+ and D- lines aren't isolated from the P0-5 in any meaningful way so all the signalling I'm generating is getting dumped onto the host to reject?


digistump

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Re: Charlieplex quirk when plugged in to USB host?
« Reply #1 on: February 11, 2013, 12:03:35 pm »
P3 and P4 are shared with D+ and D- , so the computer is seeing the pin changes, basically if you run something that uses those pins but not for USB communication then we recommend you don't power it by plugging it into a computer - though it shouldn't harm any hardware if you do.


https://s3.amazonaws.com/digispark/DigisparkSchematicFinal.pdf