C8051F93X Datasheet, PDF (241/330 Pages) Silicon Laboratories – Pipelined intstruction architecture executes 70 of instruction in 1 or 2 system clocks

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22.3.2. Arbitration
A master may start a transfer only if the bus is free. The bus is free after a STOP condition or after the SCL
and SDA lines remain high for a specified time (see Section “22.3.5. SCL High (SMBus Free) Timeout” on
page 241). In the event that two or more devices attempt to begin a transfer at the same time, an
arbitration scheme is employed to force one master to give up the bus. The master devices continue
transmitting until one attempts a HIGH while the other transmits a LOW. Since the bus is open-drain, the
bus will be pulled LOW. The master attempting the HIGH will detect a LOW SDA and lose the arbitration.
The winning master continues its transmission without interruption; the losing master becomes a slave and
receives the rest of the transfer if addressed. This arbitration scheme is non-destructive: one device
always wins, and no data is lost.
22.3.3. Clock Low Extension
SMBus provides a clock synchronization mechanism, similar to I²C, which allows devices with different
speed capabilities to coexist on the bus. A clock-low extension is used during a transfer in order to allow
slower slave devices to communicate with faster masters. The slave may temporarily hold the SCL line
LOW to extend the clock low period, effectively decreasing the serial clock frequency.
22.3.4. SCL Low Timeout
If the SCL line is held low by a slave device on the bus, no further communication is possible. Furthermore,
the master cannot force the SCL line high to correct the error condition. To solve this problem, the SMBus
protocol specifies that devices participating in a transfer must detect any clock cycle held low longer than
25 ms as a “timeout” condition. Devices that have detected the timeout condition must reset the
communication no later than 10 ms after detecting the timeout condition.
When the SMBTOE bit in SMB0CF is set, Timer 3 is used to detect SCL low timeouts. Timer 3 is forced to
reload when SCL is high, and allowed to count when SCL is low. With Timer 3 enabled and configured to
overflow after 25 ms (and SMBTOE set), the Timer 3 interrupt service routine can be used to reset (disable
and re-enable) the SMBus in the event of an SCL low timeout.
22.3.5. SCL High (SMBus Free) Timeout
The SMBus specification stipulates that if the SCL and SDA lines remain high for more that 50 µs, the bus
is designated as free. When the SMBFTE bit in SMB0CF is set, the bus will be considered free if SCL and
SDA remain high for more than 10 SMBus clock source periods (as defined by the timer configured for the
SMBus clock source). If the SMBus is waiting to generate a Master START, the START will be generated
following this timeout. A clock source is required for free timeout detection, even in a slave-only
implementation.
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