USB not recognised in VMware fusion windows 11 but VMware sees it in usb settings

Hello Simon,

I also have a personal Macbook Pro and I have used Parallels in the past and it has the same problem because of the ARM based processor.

I have asked the programming team about this a very long time ago but it is always lower priority and has not been solved yet. You can search and see other posts on the forum.

I wish I had a better answer but I also would like to be able to use my MAC for personal projects and I also want to teach a course someday but one of the schools I teach at only uses MacBooks!!!

I guess I need to raise a stink about it internally again...

Dave T

Cheers Dave

that's a pain ! I thought I may just need to down load another usb driver but I'll keep looking

I have a friend who is a coder I wonder if he could create a driver for it

it's interesting that you had a similar problem on a different VMware platform

I had thought of trying parallels for a month to see if it worked on there

i have a pc laptop but the screen has gone black and none responsive!!!

hay ho the search goes on

thanks again for replying

simon

I have a MacBook Pro with the M4 processor and I am running Windows 11 on Parallels Desktop. Sigma Studio cannot see the USB interface on my machine either. I am using an old Dell laptop to run Sigma Studio and interface with my boards.

Hi Dave

Yeay - that would be nice. I have my main office setup with a Mac mini M4 with 34" screen + my M2 Macbook Air when traveling and beeing in the measurement lab.
I'm using an older Macbook Pro 16" (Intel based) running Windows 10 in boot camp mode for the SigmaStudio. Thats the only purpose for that.

I'm supporting you all the way :-)

Best regards
John

Rather than chase down every Intel emulator, hoping that some sort of driver emulation can work on macOS, a better approach would be to make SigmaStudio run default on macOS where it can access USB directly.

Several companies like Microchip, Texas Instruments, and others have macOS default developer tools so that their customers do not need to deal with an aging operating system from a single vendor (Windows).

Dave, please suggest to the programming team that they support macOS directly with a default application. It's actually easier to develop a macOS app than a Windows app.

So your telling me this company cannot figure out how to run this software on a Mac? :( Man I am sad I went this route now.
Will they open source the project for SigmaStudio so I can make a Mac version? This seems trivial in this day and age.

It might not even be necessary to completely open-source SigmaStudio. However, documentation of the USBi protocol is absolutely necessary, because this is how SigmaStudio communicates with the hardware. Also, the file formats that SigmaStudio uses for third-party modules would be needed, so that a macOS version could support all built-in plugins as well as all third-party plugins.

Reading the tea leaves, it appears that AD has stopped developing Sigma Studio and shifted to Sigma Studio + and their Cross Core Environment tools for the ADAU14XX processors and the newer Sharc processors. From what I can see, CCES is not free which means you probably have to be a commercial developer with some resources to spend and not a DIY hobbyist to work with the newer hardware. Makes sense from a business case point of view but not so great for those of us that do this as a hobby to challenge ourselves to be better engineers and because we love it. Long story short, don't expect any improvements to Sigma Studio or porting it to a Mac OS.

I also think AD has provided enough information to figure out how the USBi protocol works. The ADAI14xx data sheets have a lot of info about the logic sequencing for messages on the SPI and I2S busses. They also have a tech note about interfacing and controlling their DSP ships from a microprocessor. That should be enough data to figure it out. Not something that is a high priority for me but looks like the info is out there.

I have been experimenting with using Gemini AI to help me do research for my day job. It occured to me that I could ask it to explain how the USBi protocol works and so I did. It prompted me with successive questions to dive deeper and deeper into the details. I ended up with a 65 page document that walked me through how it works and how to understand process of coding an ESP32 to interface with and control ADAU1452 through USBi. There is no way to attach the document here but if you are interested, start by asking Gemini:

"can you explain how the Analog Devices USBi protocol works to send and receive data from a computer running Sigma Studio to ADAU1452 DSP chip?"

The AI uses publicly available documentation and you do not have to tell it to do so. I am sure you can get most of the information you want by asking the right questions. I think this is a pretty good example of how to use AI to be a better engineer and not using AI to do our jobs for us.

We do not really need a Mac version per-say we need an updated driver that is not 16 years old. :) This is the crux of the problem with running on windows in VM ware etc.. It is the driver that ships with SigmaStudio install and it should get addressed and updated

; Installation INF for the Cypress Generic USB Driver for Windows Vista
; Processor support for x86 based platforms.
;
; (c) Copyright 2010 Cypress Semiconductor Corporation
;

[Version]
Signature="$WINDOWS NT$"
Class=USB
ClassGUID={36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}
provider=%CYUSB_Provider%
CatalogFile=CYUSB.cat
DriverVer=02/02/2010,3.4.2.147

Correct as I mentioned in another reply simply updating the driver that gets shipped with SigmaStudio would be sufficient.

; Installation INF for the Cypress Generic USB Driver for Windows Vista
; Processor support for x86 based platforms.
;
; (c) Copyright 2010 Cypress Semiconductor Corporation
;

[Version]
Signature="$WINDOWS NT$"
Class=USB
ClassGUID={36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}
provider=%CYUSB_Provider%
CatalogFile=CYUSB.cat
DriverVer=02/02/2010,3.4.2.147

There are two cables on the USBi, and each uses a different protocol by necessity. The ribbon cable carries SPI or I2C, and you may be right that AD has provided enough information for that side. The USB cable is obviously using the USB protocol, which is layered to include Device Classes. macOS automatically supports standard USB Device classes like mouse, keyboard, storage, camera, audio, etc. The USBi is a Custom Class Device, meaning that there is no driver for its protocol. Fortunately, macOS allows user applications to directly access a USB Device without a driver, and reach all of the Device endpoints, regardless of their endpoint type, but there still is a protocol on each endpoint that is known only to Analog Devices.

I'm saying that AD has to document the USB protocol so that an application running on the USB Host can talk to the USBi Device. I expect that there are commands to select between I2C and SPI, and for each of those types, there will be type-specific commands to, e.g., set the I2C address.

I have designed several USB Device and USB Host products, so I'm familiar with macOS support for custom applications' access to standard Classes as well as Custom Classes like the USBi, but there are details that only AD knows - unless you're saying that there are details of the USB Device Class endpoint protocols - those would be very helpful if they exist.

Thanks for mentioning the Cross Core Environment tools. The home page for the ADAU1463 that I am using leads me to SigmaStudio, so I didn't realize that there might be a newer tool that is actively supported.

I think it is rather obvious that Analog Devices has moved on from putting development resources into this product line. They will continue to sell the Sigma 300/350 series as long as there is demand but if they have not bothered to update drivers in 16 years, what makes you think they will now? I believe we need to find ways to work with what is and move forward with that.