nexys 4 Nexys 4 - how to implement non mouse/keyboard USB device

[arijit]

I have a Digilent Nexys 4 board with me, and a medical device that provides streaming data via USB slave out, and I understand that my board has a USB HID, but it is connected to a PIC uC which converts it to PS/2 signal for me to use it. I was trying to implement a PS/2 controller to read this but then I came across this post on your forums where a Digilent technician said that video cameras are not supported, only mice and keyboards are.

So I'd like to know how to connect a non mouse, non keyboard USB device to my board. This isn't an easy thing to Google so apologies if the answer was in the open.

Regards

[jpeyron]

Hi @arijit,

My initial thought is maybe attaching the medical device with a usb female to micro usb male(cable) to the FPGA through the PmodUSBUART using one of the PMOD Ports. What is the device you are trying to use?

cheers,

Jon 

[D@n]

@jpeyron,

Wouldn't that require the medical device to have an "on-the-go" USB interface, allowing it to be both master and slave?  I would find that ... unlikely.

@arijit,

Another possible solution would be to get a board with a proper USB host interface, such as the ChipKit boards.  You could then interface that to the Nexys-4 if you wanted, but ... you'd still need a board with a proper USB PHY.

Dan

P.S.  I was originally going to propose building your own low-speed USB PHY with the Nexys-IO ... then I read about what that would entail.  (Yikes!)  Cheaper/easier to get a board with the PHY on it that you need.

[arijit]

@jpeyron well i do not know what the device is, but I want to support any USB device basically, though it will probably be a medical device with USB slave out

@D@n thank you, do you know of any chip+PHY/boards, that are popular to convert USB to something else (such as UART), anything that you could recommend? 

 

[D@n]

@arijit,

I purchased the ChipKit WF32 for that purpose, but I haven't done anything USB related with it (yet), so I can't tell you if it would work for that purpose or not.

Dan