USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

lammobile — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 02:34:23 GMT

Hi Jared,

Thank you for your enthusiasm

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

Jared — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 08:04:54 GMT

Aaah Good catch, must admit that I didn't notice that right away,

Thanks for returning with the solution, it will help others that face the same issue later,

regards

Jared

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

lammobile — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 03:19:34 GMT

Finally, it's working. I followed the suggestion from this ticket to allow the application to request connectivity to enable PA and LNA pins.

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../74400

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

lammobile — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 08:10:27 GMT

On the USB840X, I conducted an experiment to measure the signals of 4 GPIOs (APP_PA_PIN, APP_LNA_PIN, APP_CHL_PIN, and APP_CPS_PIN), which control the SKY66112-11 chip. Since direct wire soldering to Pins (P0.17, P0.19, P0.06, and P0.08) was not possible, I switched to (P0.02, P0.03, P0.11, and P0.13) - and we can also perform this experiment with the nRF52840-DK.

[PA - TX] When running the heart rate experiment (`nRF5_SDK_15.3.0_59ac345\examples\ble_peripheral\ble_app_hrs\pca10059`) and adding the PA/LNA control block, I could observe signals on the PA_PIN and LNA_PIN, indicating that GPIOTE and PPI were operational.

[LNA - RX] When running the experiment with ble_connectivity (`nRF5_SDK_15.3.0_59ac345\examples\connectivity\ble_connectivity\pca10059\ser_s140_usb_hci`), I didn't see any signals output on the PA_PIN and LNA_PIN.

Could you let me know if the softdevice in ble_connectivity is activated?

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../ble_5F00_connectivity.rar

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../2273.ble_5F00_app_5F00_hrs.rar

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../6740.pca10059.h

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

lammobile — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 03:21:51 GMT

Hi Jared,

When I enable LNA on the Fanstel dongle (which acts as the Center device with ble_connectivity firmware), if I place the peripheral device and the Fanstel dongle close to each other, it works well, with a sample rate of 256 data packets/second (= 128 ble packets/second - combining 2 data packets for transmission at once).

However, when I move the device further away, the throughput gradually decreases, and even at a distance of 50cm, it disconnects.

We are using the Fanstel dongle as a Bluetooth adapter compatible with pc-ble-driver, which provides C/C++ libraries for Bluetooth Low Energy nRF5 SoftDevice serialization. Rather than relying on built-in Bluetooth and OS parameters.

According to this documentation, the Fanstel dongle acts as a Connectivity chip and is loaded with connectivity firmware (<InstallFolder>\examples\connectivity).

Here, in the original code, we only need to call the nrf_sdh_enable_request function, but to initialize the PA/LNA, it needs to be called after the ble_stack_init function, which we have added. We are unsure whether this is the correct flow and suitable for the application?

#ifdef APP_PA_LNA

#define APP_BLE_CONN_CFG_TAG                1                                       /**< A tag identifying the SoftDevice BLE configuration. */
#define APP_BLE_OBSERVER_PRIO               3                                       /**< Application's BLE observer priority. You shouldn't need to modify this value. */


static void ble_stack_init(void)
{
    ret_code_t err_code;

    err_code = nrf_sdh_enable_request();
    APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);

    // Configure the BLE stack using the default settings.
    // Fetch the start address of the application RAM.
    uint32_t ram_start = 0;
    err_code = nrf_sdh_ble_default_cfg_set(APP_BLE_CONN_CFG_TAG, &ram_start);
    APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);

    // Enable BLE stack.
    err_code = nrf_sdh_ble_enable(&ram_start);
    APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);

    // Register a handler for BLE events.
    NRF_SDH_BLE_OBSERVER(m_ble_observer, APP_BLE_OBSERVER_PRIO, ble_evt_handler, NULL);
}
#endif 




int main(void) {


...

#ifdef APP_PA_LNA
  ble_stack_init();

  nrf_gpio_cfg_output(APP_CPS_PIN);
  nrf_gpio_cfg_output(APP_CHL_PIN);
  nrf_gpio_pin_set(APP_CHL_PIN);
  nrf_gpio_pin_clear(APP_CPS_PIN); //enable
  pa_lna_init(APP_PA_PIN, APP_LNA_PIN);
#else
    err_code = nrf_sdh_enable_request();
    APP_ERROR_CHECK(err_code);
#endif 
...
}

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

Jared — Mon, 08 Apr 2024 11:38:20 GMT

Hi,

I see, and when you enable the LNA you see more packets being dropped?

What rate of packets drop do you see when you enable the LNA? How much is the difference?

[quote user="lammobile"]

2. I'm assuming the nRF52840 + LNA is on a custom board, can you share the design file (schematic + layout)?

It's the Fanstel BT840X, unfortunately, we only have the documentation provided by the manufacturer here.

[/quote]

SW wise I can't think of anything that would cause a higher packet loss since you use PPI + GPIOTE to setup the radio events so that the PA/LNA is enabled automatically. Which is correct,

regards

Jared

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

lammobile — Mon, 08 Apr 2024 02:51:50 GMT

Thanks for your help.

1. How do you monitor the throughput?

I can verify throughput using the packet counter (for example, N packets/second). It ensures functionality with the bypass mode, but in LNA mode, I'm not receiving an adequate amount of requested packets.

2. I'm assuming the nRF52840 + LNA is on a custom board, can you share the design file (schematic + layout)?

It's the Fanstel BT840X, unfortunately, we only have the documentation provided by the manufacturer here.

3. I can make the case private first if you prefer it.

The public is okay with this ticket.

Thanks.

RE: USB840X Fanstel dongle (enable PA/LNA) with ble_connectivity does not guarantee throughput.

Jared — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 11:38:44 GMT

Hi,

How do you monitor the throughput?

I'm assuming the nRF52840 + LNA is on a custom board, can you share the design file (schematic + layout)?

I can make the case private first if you prefer it.

regards

Jared