MAX7300
2-Wire-Interfaced, 2.5V to 5.5V, 20-Port or
28-Port I/O Expander
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Serial Interface
Serial Addressing
The MAX7300 operates as a slave that sends and
receives data through an I
2
C-compatible 2-wire inter-
face. The interface uses a serial data line (SDA) and a
serial clock line (SCL) to achieve bidirectional commu-
nication between master(s) and slave(s). A master (typ-
ically a microcontroller) initiates all data transfers to and
from the MAX7300, and generates the SCL clock that
synchronizes the data transfer (Figure 2).
The MAX7300 SDA line operates as both an input and
an open-drain output. A pullup resistor, typically 4.7kΩ,
is required on SDA. The MAX7300 SCL line operates
only as an input. A pullup resistor, typically 4.7kΩ, is
required on SCL if there are multiple masters on the 2-
wire interface, or if the master in a single-master system
has an open-drain SCL output.
Each transmission consists of a START condition
(Figure 3) sent by a master, followed by the MAX7300
7-bit slave address plus R/W bit (Figure 6), a register
address byte, one or more data bytes, and finally a
STOP condition (Figure 3).
START and STOP Conditions
Both SCL and SDA remain high when the interface is
not busy. A master signals the beginning of a transmis-
sion with a START (S) condition by transitioning SDA
from high to low while SCL is high. When the master
has finished communicating with the slave, it issues a
STOP (P) condition by transitioning SDA from low to
high while SCL is high. The bus is then free for another
transmission (Figure 3).
Bit Transfer
One data bit is transferred during each clock pulse.
The data on SDA must remain stable while SCL is high
(Figure 4).
Acknowledge
The acknowledge bit is a clocked 9th bit, which the
recipient uses to handshake receipt of each byte of
data (Figure 5). Thus, each byte transferred effectively
requires 9 bits. The master generates the 9th clock
pulse, and the recipient pulls down SDA during the
acknowledge clock pulse, such that the SDA line is sta-
ble low during the high period of the clock pulse. When
the master is transmitting to the MAX7300, the
MAX7300 generates the acknowledge bit since the
Table 1. Port Configuration Map
