Lecture #3

RS232 & RS485 protocols

Instructor:
Dr. Rounakul Islam
AGENDA
What is RS232
• Signals, Line Driver, Speed & SW settings

What is RS-485
• Line Driver, Network, Half-duplex, Full-duplex & DL devices

RS-232 vs RS-458

Transmission Terminology Signals &

Analog vs. Digital
RS23
2
 WHAT IS RS-232

• RS-232 is a popular communications interface for connecting

modems and data acquisition devices (i.e. GPS receivers,
electronic balances, data loggers, ...) to computers.
• RS-232 can be plugged straight into the computer’s serial
port
(know as COM or Comm port).
 RS-232 SIGNALS
• Architecturally RS-232 is a bi-
directional point to point link. (serial port - PC side)

 Two independent channels

are established for two-way
(full-duplex)
communications.
 RS-232 can also carry
additional signals used for
flow control (RTS, CTS)
and modem control (DCD,
DTR, DSR, RI).
 RS-232 Signals..
• Common 25 pin D-shell connector pinout used for
asynchronous data communications.

Pi Signal
n PGND Protective Ground
1 TXD Transmit Data
2 RXD Receive Data
3 RTS Ready To Send
4 CTS Clear To Send
5 DSR Data Set
6 Ready SG Signal (serial port - PC side)
7 Ground CD Carrier
8 Detect
20 DTR Data Terminal
22 Ready RI Ring
Indicator
 RS-232 LINE DRIVER
• Unbalanced Line Drivers
• Each signal appears on the interface connector as a voltage with
reference to a signal ground.
• The “idle” state (MARK) has the signal level negative with respect to
common whereas the active state (SPACE) has the signal level
positive respest to the same reference.
 RS-232 SPEED
• How fast can RS-232 be?
• The maximum speed, according to the standard, is 20kbit/s.
However, modern equipment can operate much faster than this.
(i.e. Lynx can reach 115200 baud.)
• The length of the cable also plays a part in maximum speed.
The longer the cable the slower the speed at which you can
obtain accurate results.
• A large wire capacitance and inductance limits the maximum length
of the cable and/or the maximum speed; Moreover higher is the
capacitance of the cable higher is the interference between two
adjacent signal wire.
50 feet (15m) @ max baudrate is commonly quoted as the
maximum distance.
 RS-232 SW SETTINGS
• One byte of async data has:
• Start Bit = 1 (always)
• Data Bits = 8 (or 7)
• Stop bits = 1 (or 2)
• Parity = NONE (or EVEN or ODD)
+
25

-
2
5
RS48
5
 WHAT IS RS-485
• What is RS-485?
• RS-485 is a EIA standard interface which is very common in the data
acquisition world
• RS-485 provides balanced transmission line which also can be shared
in Multidrop mode.
• It allows high data rates communications over long distances in
real world environments.
• How fast can RS-485 be?
• RS-485 was designed for greater distance and higher baudrates
than RS-232.
• According to the standard, 100kbit/s is the maximum speed and
distance up to 4000 feet (1200 meters) can be achieved.
 RS-485 LINE DRIVER
• Balanced Line Drivers
• Voltage produced by the driver appears across a pair of signal
wires that transmit only one signal. Both wires are driven
opposite.
• RS-485 driver has always the “Enable” direction control signal.
• Differential system provides noise immunity, because much of
the common mode signal can be rejected by the receiver. So
ground shifts and induced noise signals can be nullified.
 RS-485 NETWORK
• RS-485 provides Half-Duplex, Multidrop communications over a
single twisted pair cable.

 The standard SLAVE-1

MASTER
specifies up to 32
drivers and 32
receivers can share
a multidrop network
SLAVE-2
 Terminator SLAVE-3

resistors avoid
reflected signal
 RS-485 Half-
duplex
• Datalogic uses Half-Duplex configurations for Data Collecting
and Master/Slave layouts.
TX

ENABLE
Slave 1
RX

RTX485 TX

+
RTX485
TX - ENABLE
Slave 2
ENABLE
RX
RX

TX
485GND
ENABLE
Slave N
RX
Master
 RS-485 FULL-DUPLEX
• Potentially RS-485 interface can also use 4-wires to communicate in
multidrop
mode.

TX485+
TX485-
TX TX
ENABLE ENABLE
RX485+
RX RX
RX485-
485GND

Other device
Scanner
RS-232 VS RS-
485
 RS-232 VS RS-485
• The architectural difference between RS-232 and RS-485 is that
232 is a bi-directional point to point link, whereas 485 is a single
channel bus.
• Electrically, each 232 signal uses a single wire with symmetric
voltages about a common ground wire. 485 uses two wires to
carry the single signal differentially.
• The big difference to the software is that only one device on a
485 bus can transmit at a time, whilst there is not similar
limitation on RS232 because is a peer-to-peer link .
RS-232 VS RS-485
DATA FORMAT AND PROTOCOLS
• Information content passing through peer-to-peer
connection
• is packed in a very simple structure:
• <Header-string> <Code identifier
><INFO-FIELD><Terminator- string>
• <Header-string> and <Terminator-
string> are both configurable
• via software (device configuration
parameters)
• Most common generic Handshake are
available/selectable with RS232 interface:
• Hardware (RTS-CTS)
• Software XON/XOFF
DATA
TRANSMISSION
 DATA TRANSMISSION
• The successful transmission of data depends on two factors:

• The quality of the signal being transmitted

• The characteristics of the transmission medium

• Data transmission occurs between a transmitter and a

receiver over some transmission medium.
• Guided media – physical path
• twisted pair, coaxial cable, optical fiber
• Unguided (wireless) media
• Air, water , vacuum
 TRANSMISSION TERMINOLOGY
• Direct link
• Transmission path from transmitter to receiver with no intermediate
devices
(other than amplifiers)
• Point to point
• Direct link between the only two devices sharing the medium (Note:
can apply to unguided media)
• Multipoint
• More than two devices share the same medium
• Simplex
• Signal transmitted in one direction
• e.g. cable television
• Half-duplex
• Both stations may transmit, but one at a time
• e.g. police radio
• Full-duplex
• Both stations
• e.g. may transmit simultaneously
telephone
 23
ANALOG VS. DIGITAL
• Analog signal
• Signal intensity varies in a smooth, continuous, fashion over
time
– no breaks
• Digital signal
• Signal intensity maintains constant level for some period of
time and then abruptly changes to another constant level –
discrete signals
24 PERIODIC SIGNAL
Sine
25
(periodic continuous
Wave
signal)
• Peak amplitude (A)
• Maximum strength of signal
• Typically measured in volts
• Frequency (f)
• Rate at which signal repeats
• Period (T) is time to repeat T = 1 / f
• Hertz (Hz) or cycles per second
• Phase ()
• Relative position in time within a single period
Varying Sine Waves
26
s(t) = A sin(2ft
+)
 WAVELENGTH ()

• Distance occupied by a single cycle

or
Distance between two points of corresponding phase of two
consecutive cycles
• Signal with velocity v, then wavelength is
 = vT or f = v

• Consider signal travelling at speed of light

v = c = 3 x 108 m/s
 28
FREQUENCY DOMAIN CONCEPTS
• Signals are made up of many frequencies
• Components are sine waves
• Fourier analysis can show any signal is made up of
components at various frequencies
• Each component is a sinusoid
• Can plot frequency domain functions
 29

Addition of
Frequency
Component
s (T = 1/f)
 30
SPECTRUM & BANDWIDTH
• Spectrum
• Range of frequencies contained in a signal
• e.g. f and 3f on previous slide
• Absolute bandwidth
• Width of the spectrum
• e.g. 2f
• Effective bandwidth (or just “bandwidth”)
• Narrow band of frequencies containing most of the energy in
the signal
 31
DATA RATE AND BANDWIDTH
• Any transmission system can carry only a limited band of
frequencies
• Limits the data rate that can be carried
• Square waves have infinite components
• Infinite bandwidth
• Most energy in first few components
• Limiting bandwidth creates distortions
 32
DATA, SIGNALS, AND
• Data TRANSMISSION
• Entities that convey information
• Signals
• Electric or electromagnetic representations of data
• Signaling
• Physical propagation of signal along medium
• Transmission
• Communication of data by propagation and processing of
signals
 DIGITAL DATA & SIGNALS
• Text (character strings)
• Coded into sequence of bits
• IRA – International Reference Alphabet (ASCII)
• 7-bit code with parity bit
• Image
• Coded into pixels with number of bits per pixel
• May then be compressed

• Advantages
• Cheaper
• Less susceptible to noise interference
• Disadvantages
• Suffer more from attenuation (strength
loss)
34 ANALOG SIGNALS
35 DIGITAL SIGNALS