Programmer SFPTotal Mini

Overview

The SFPTotal Mini is a compact coding board designed to support 1G SFP, 10G SFP+ and 25G SFP28 transceivers, including copper RJ45 SFP, PON OLT SFP, DAC and AOC.

The coding board is manufactured in accordance to specifications MSA SFF-8074, SFF-8431, SFF-8472 and contains 20-pin SFP port (SFF-8431), micro USB port and and power jack to connect external power supply 5V DC for optical transceivers with high power level consumption: more than 1.5 W.

The hardware design provides for the presence pinouts for power supply control and access to main I/O lines of the transceiver ports, that could be required for coding hardware protected transceivers.

SFPTotal Mini device has an embedded software based on proprietary SFPTotal protocol and full-compatible with an official software SFPTotal Wizard, that make possible to proceed flexible coding for write-protected transceivers from diffrent manufacturers.

It contains everything needed to support SFP form factor transceivers. Simply connect it to a computer with a USB cable to get started.

Main Features

Compared with similar coding devices, SFPTotal Mini has the following advantages:

• Supports transceivers with speed rate up to 25G on the one coding board
• Provides required power supply to connect powerful optical transceviers 1.5 W and more
• Transceivers support doesn't limited on just one manufacturer
• Provides access to all address spaces of transceiver memory
• Makes possible to recode write-protected MSA transceivers
• Supports coding with a script for non-MSA transceivers
• Supports hardware password search for password locked transceiver
• Has official software with friendly and convinient GUI
• Real-time access to Digital Diagnosting Monitoring interface
• Gives access to knowlege database and SFPTotal technical support.

Application

SFPTotal Mini programmer is used for the following tasks:

• Coding fiber optical and copper transceivers, DAC, AOC
• Improving transceivers compatibility with brand network switching equipment
• Coding write-protected transceivers variouse manufacturers
• Access to PHY controller registers and manual configuration
• DWDM SFP+ tunable transceiver channel control
• Reading DDM interface and check factory presets
• Code rebranding for OEM transceivers
• Test platform for pre-sales preparation of transceivers

Quick start

The coding board connects to PC using USB type C cable included to the kit. The operation system detects the device and intalls required Virtual Serial Port driver when device connected firstly. Follow simple steps to start:

1. Install SFPTotal Mini driver
2. Download and run application SFPTotal Wizard

The SFPTotal coding board manages through official software SFPTotal Wizard which provides user interface to operate the coding board for write and read code and get access to the main features. Тhere is no preliminary configuration is required to start working with the program. SFPTotal Wizard will automatically detect original coding board connected to the PC.

After installing the driver on some versions of Windows OS, a mandatory system reboot is required for the virtual serial port driver to work correctly.

Activation key

SFPTotal Mini is supplied with limited functionality which makes able to test the device before use, but the write function is limited. The activation is required to make sure the device will be run by end customer, but not a dealer or an agent.

That policy makes SFPTotal able to provide the best warranty conditions and service, helps to be sure the device has not been used before sale and it will work stable for a long time. Also, when the device has been activated, we count warranty date from the moment of activation key issue, not the purchase date.

The activation key is an unique value for every coding board and associated with its serial number. The key must be applied for the coding board to remove the functionality restrictions.

The activation key includes into the SFPTotal coding board kit: it issues after purchase the device and becomes available in customer account on the website.

If you bought SFPTotal coding board through dealer and didn't get an activation key, you can sign up on the website and get an activation key for your device free.

You don't need to repeat an activation procedure for the coding board when connect to another PC or reinstall operation system. The activation makes once and it is permanent for the device.

Coding optical transceivers

Coding unlocked transceivers

The most optical transceivers with unlocked memory contain EEPROM chip such as 24C02 which stores informtaion about transceiver form factor, wavelength, transmission technology, speedrate, encoding type, vendor name, serial number and etc. That solution presented in a lot of cheap gigabit transceivers and DAC which don't support DDM function. The memory of those transceivers can be rewritten normally without any restriction from the transceiver.

In such transceivers, as a rule, only the A0H page is available for reading, but reading the A2H page returns an error. You need just import a vendor code into the software or edit a generic code from the module, then press Write button to write to such modules. The coding board returns WRITE OK response when the write successfuly done.

You can use the transceiver with updated vendor code after that!

Coding write-protected transceivers

In accordance with the MSA SFF-8472 specification, DDM capable transceivers can be write protected and require entry a 4 byte password to unlock the memory before write any change.

Such modules operate under the control of a special microcontroller, which emulates an EEPROM chip and provides write functionality in I2C slave mode. Also, it can work as a buffer for EEPROM and control Write Protect pin of the memory chip. An attempt to write to such a transceiver without a password or with an incorrect password returns an error - WRITE FAIL.

The software SFPTotal Wizard supports the function to change a write settings and makes able to set a password value to unlock the memory before saving new changes. In addition, the software allows to create complex programming algorithms in the form of scripts. It makes possible to code transceivers that require factory coding method what is incompatible with specification MSA.