Passive listening to USB communication

Question

Is it possible to passively listen on low speed USB communication?

Suppose I connect a logic analyzer to D+ or D- line, will I see a valid data?

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered May 03 '10 at 00:25

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I'm not certain about this, but I believe that if you look at the differential voltage between the two lines, you will see data, but it will be NRZI encoded. This means that the bits are encoded by whether the bus level changes or not. Change (in either direction) means 0 and no change (for one bit-time) means 1.

I believe there are also CRCs and other signaling bytes at the beginning and end of packets.

answered May 03 '10 at 00:25

pingswept

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It's all in the USB spec. The normal bits are differential, but the "end of packet" signal is both lines pulled low, so you need to look at both, really. – endolith May 03 '10 at 02:31
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Here's a decent summary of the packets used: http://www.beyondlogic.org/usbnutshell/usb3.htm – pingswept May 03 '10 at 02:38
Don't forget about bit stuffing! – ajs410 May 03 '10 at 18:29

score 4 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 18 '13 at 06:20

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This is what you need http://www.totalphase.com/products/beagle_usb480/, it is a USB 2.0 protocol analyzer, comes with software that will parse out USB traffic, and will be much easier to use than a logic analyzer. I have one of these for I2C/SPI and it works well, plus, Bunnie uses it http://andrew.huang.usesthis.com/

edited Feb 18 '13 at 06:20

m.Alin

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answered May 03 '10 at 19:43

mateja

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score 3 · Answer 3 · answered May 03 '10 at 00:24

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Yes, it should work. Ideally you'd use a logic analyzer that can capture & decode USB traffic, otherwise you will have trouble finding the data you are interested in.

answered May 03 '10 at 00:24

davr

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Passive listening to USB communication

3 Answers3