VPlex - additional AD2* device needed?

[RipNCode]

I want to make sure I understand the current state of VPlex support correctly. It appears that (with the V2.2a.8.8 stable) firmware that I need a second device to read the VPlex bus. Is this something that will be required for the forseeable future, or are there changes under development to allow a single device (in my case, an AD2USB) to read both busses?

If ultimately I'll need two devices, then one additional question: can the AD2Pi hat be used with an additional hat (in this case, I'm looking at a HiFiBerry connecting to the GPIO pins so that my automation system can create better audible events depending on alarm events).

Thanks

[mathewss]

You will need two. I only designed the device with two 12v compatible IO lines. The rest of the lines available on the expansion header of the AD2 are all 3 or 5v depending on the supply voltage of the board say Pi that is 3v3.

That being said also the firmware itself has dedicated all of its abilities to watching one type of signal watching two is no trivial task for that little CPU on the AD2 especially since the baud rate on the VPlex bus is faster than the keypad bus and about the limit of what I can track it would not even work to try to combine these tasks.

I only use the GPIO UART pins for communication. You would need a stacking header on the HiFiBerry but from what I see they do not use UART0 and I do so they "should" not conflict. AFAIK even the new board where I am adding the 32k flash chip they "should" work together as all official hats need this chip and must play nice on the i2c bus.

Current AD2Pi.
GPIO14(8) UART0_TXD
GIOP15(10) UART0_RXD
New AD2Pi HAT adds these pins.
GPIO18(12) RESET AD2
GPIO23(16) MONITOR AD2 heartbeat
ID_SD(27) SDA of AD2 32k identity flash chip.
ID_SC(28) SDC of AD2 32k identity flash chip.

Best
Sean M

[RipNCode]

Hi Sean,

Thanks for the quick response. I need to think a little bit about how I want to architect this wrt the home automation system. Presently, it doesn't allow for more than one connection in the binding, and I'm running out of connection ports on the Pi, as is. I'll be buying another device, whether it's an AD2USB or AD2Pi is going to depend on what else I need on another Pi.

I'm definitely in need of VPlex support, and I'm up for helping test things as you may need. First, I need to beef this setup out a bit more and I'll be expanding it in the coming weeks...