TI rolls first IEEE 1394b PHY device

The TSB81BA3 IEEE 1394b (FireWire) three-port cable transceiver/arbiter from Texas Instruments Inc. is capable of data rates of up to 800Mbps and increases communication distances up to 100m. It is targeted at PCs, server networks, A/V HDDs, musical instrument controllers, and home networking for A/V distribution.

The 80-pin PFP PHY device is backward-compatible with 1394a devices, supporting both the data strobe encoding scheme of IEEE 1394a-2000 and the new 8B/10B encoding scheme for 1394b. It also allows any cable topology to be used, enabling loops to be automatically detected and corrected.

It operates from 1.8V and 3.3V supplies and features cable power presence monitoring, power-down features, and fail-safe circuitry. The TSB81BA3 is also fully-compliant with the Open Host Controller Interface (OHCI) standard to ensure compatibility with Macintosh and PC host systems with PCI buses.