Controlling an SPI device with the Raspberry Pi

2 min read

Controlling an SPI device with the Raspberry Pi

2 min read

The Raspberry Pi has a Broadcom BCM 2835 chip allowing it to interface with SPI devices on its GPIO pins. There are two chip select pins meaning that the Pi can control two devices simultaneously.

P1 Header Pin Function
19 MOSI – master output slave input
21 MISO – master input slave output
23 SCLK – clock
24 CE0 – chip enable 0
26 CE1 – chip enable 1

Step 1: Enable SPI on the Raspberry Pi

  1. In your Pi’s terminal, run
    sudo raspi-config
  2. Go to Advanced Options > SPI
  3. Choose “Yes” for both questions then select Finish to exit raspi-config
  4. Either reboot your Pi or run this command to load the kernel module
    sudo modprobe spi-bcm2708

Step 2: Install spidev

Spidev is a python module that allows us to interface with the Pi’s SPI bus.Watch movie online The Transporter Refueled (2015)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install python-dev python3-dev
cd ~
git clone https://github.com/doceme/py-spidev.git
cd py-spidev
make
sudo make install

Step 3: Python script

Finally, we can write and run a python script to control the SPI device.

  1. Create a file called spi-test.py in your favorite editor
    #!/usr/bin/python
    
    import spidev
    import time
    
    spi = spidev.SpiDev()
    spi.open(0, 0)
    spi.max_speed_hz = 7629
    
    # Split an integer input into a two byte array to send via SPI
    def write_pot(input):
        msb = input >> 8
        lsb = input & 0xFF
        spi.xfer([msb, lsb])
    
    # Repeatedly switch a MCP4151 digital pot off then on
    while True:
        write_pot(0x1FF)
        time.sleep(0.5)
        write_pot(0x00)
        time.sleep(0.5)
  2. Make the file executable and run it
    chmod +x spi-test.py
    sudo ./spi-test.py

Notes on spidev

Unless the spi.max_speed_hz field is a value accepted by the driver, the script will fail when you run it. The field can be set to these values on the raspberry pi:

Speed spi.max_speed_hz value
125.0 MHz 125000000
62.5 MHz 62500000
31.2 MHz 31200000
15.6 MHz 15600000
7.8 MHz 7800000
3.9 MHz 3900000
1953 kHz 1953000
976 kHz 976000
488 kHz 488000
244 kHz 244000
122 kHz 122000
61 kHz 61000
30.5 kHz 30500
15.2 kHz 15200
7629 Hz 7629

Two SPI devices can be controlled in python by creating two SpiDev objects, one for each device.

spi = spidev.SpiDev()
spi.open(0, 0)
spi.max_speed_hz = 976000

spi2 = spidev.SpiDev()
spi2.open(0, 1)
spi2.max_speed_hz = 976000

25 Comments

  • Luan Florencio November 25, 2020 at 6:55 am

    Use the command:

    spi = spidev.SpiDev()
    spi.open(0, 0)
    spi.max_speed_hz = 7629

    #for example
    spi.readbytes(n)
    #Read n bytes from SPI device

  • Marius November 4, 2020 at 11:59 am

    Hey Guys! Our Skript is running but.. nothing happens.. we connectet the wires like they should.. but we measure all the time the same resistance.. can anybody help us?

  • Leonardo June 23, 2020 at 5:17 am

    How to read instead of write?

    • Luan Florencio November 25, 2020 at 6:56 am

      Use the command:

      spi = spidev.SpiDev()
      spi.open(0, 0)
      spi.max_speed_hz = 7629

      #for example
      spi.readbytes(n)
      #Read n bytes from SPI device

  • adrian May 13, 2020 at 1:33 am

    best Raspberry Pi SPI faq on the web

  • Brijesh Khanna January 1, 2020 at 1:05 am

    spi.open(0, 0)
    FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory

    this is the message i get when i run spitest file
    i am using mcp3008 for converting my analog values
    it was working fine till dec 30 2019 the last time i tested but today it throws up this error whats happening ??

    • huzd January 16, 2020 at 9:54 pm

      ls /dev/spi*

  • Janet Gutierrez July 20, 2018 at 9:27 pm

    The “proper” Raspberry Pi Linux SPI driver is currently going through review to allow arbitrary gpios to be used as CS.

    • Maria August 26, 2018 at 5:51 am

      Hey! Me too. Have you solved the problem?

  • Marta June 16, 2018 at 2:14 am

    Hey guys,

    did someone also get an error “invalid syntax” in line 12 (msb = input >> 8)?

    Thank you!

    • Takaitra January 18, 2019 at 9:10 pm

      I can’t reproduce that error. What version of Python are you running? You can find out via the command ‘python –version’

  • Lukas June 8, 2018 at 4:41 am

    Hello Guys,

    I need help. I have RPi 3B and use Display-O-Tron Hat, but I needed same time used EXPLORE-NFC-WW so I bought this http://rpishop.cz/907-gpio-multiplexovaci-modul.html

    Now, I have problem with display. I cant use backlight (lcd work) because I get this error.
    Code: Select all

    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “bargraph.py”, line 5, in
    import dot3k.backlight as backlight
    File “/usr/local/lib/python3.5/dist-packages/dot3k/backlight.py”, line 1, in
    import sn3218, colorsys, math
    File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/sn3218.py”, line 114, in
    enable_leds(0b111111111111111111)
    File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/sn3218.py”, line 62, in enable_leds
    [enable_mask & 0x3F, (enable_mask >> 6) & 0x3F, (enable_mask >> 12) & 0X3F])
    OSError: [Errno 121] Remote I/O error
    Okey this is problem NFC use SPI , when I remove NFC Board from HUB Displey work correctly, so that is conflict. But how to use both board same times without conflict?

    I do not understand how I set SPI for it.

    Can You help me?

    Sorry for my English 🙂 and thank you for your help

    • Takaitra July 27, 2018 at 3:34 pm

      Please read SparkFun’s excellent tutorial on SPI to understand how multiple SPI slave devices can be connected to the Raspberry Pi. Essentially the SCK, MOSI and MISO pins are shared between the two slave devices and there will be a different SS (slave select) pin attached to each device. If I recall correctly the Raspberry Pi can support up to two SPI devices.

      https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/serial-peripheral-interface-spi/slave-select-ss

  • Walter Phipps February 26, 2018 at 8:28 am

    Thank you for this. I have a programmeable potentiometer so will try it later. However, the line:
    sudo apt-get install python-dev python3-dev

    did not allow “spidev” to be installed so I used the following:
    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get upgrade
    sudo apt-get install python-spidev python3-spidev

    I cannot find “spidev” but I am using some coding that imports “spidev” and now the programme works. It is not necessary to store the programme in “py-spidev”.

    Thanks for your help.

  • Phil December 20, 2017 at 9:15 pm

    Hi, great instructions for someone like me who is in retirement years and just starting out with a rpi zero w. I don’t think I will have a problem getting the spi up and running, but after I get my information of my device, do you have any advise as how I can get that information into a node-red flow? I am trying to get the output of a max6675 thermocouple controller to the input of a nice gauge for showing the temperature of my kiln.

    • Takaitra December 29, 2017 at 10:46 pm

      Hi Phil, the Node-RED Raspberry Pi documentation mentions the wiring-pi module that you could use to communicate via SPI. The Wiring Pi SPI library documentation is here.

      Node-RED mentions this is an “advanced” use case and requires writing a JavaScript function.

  • Kurt August 24, 2017 at 2:05 pm

    The middle “2 byte array” part confused me but for anyone else who is also confused here’s an explanation:
    lets say we want to send the number 770 to the device (1100000010). The info needs to be sent in bytes(packages of 8 bits), and since the number is 10 bits long, we need to split it (into “11” and “00000010”).

    To get the first part we need to use the “>>” bitwise operator.”>>” takes an integer and removes bits from that integer from the end as it is represented in binary. So 770>>8 removes the last 8 bits and leaves us with a 3 (11 in binary).

    To get the 2nd part we need to use the “&” bitwise operator to leave us with the last 8 bits of our number. “&” takes two numbers, converts them to binary, compares the two, and outputs a resulting number where both bits are 1 for each position. An easy way to get only the last 8 bits of our number is to compare our number to a number that is 11111111 in binary (255 in integers or FF in hex)(0xFF = 255 in python, as does 0b11111111). So 770 & 0xFF gives us 2 (00000010 or 10 in binary)

    we can then use spi.xfer([3,2]) to send our number

  • Robert Poor June 18, 2017 at 8:09 am

    Minor typo: `write_put(0x00)` should be `write_pot(0x00)`

  • Mike M May 16, 2017 at 8:35 am

    The second write should be “write_pot(0x00)” rather than “write_put(0x00)”.

  • rpi January 27, 2017 at 10:24 am

    I get a segmentation fault after I do ‘make’ in Step 2:

    cd py-spidev
    make

    Any idea how to resolve this issue?

  • Mike December 28, 2016 at 8:05 pm

    Hi Takaitra, I saw your example on “Controlling an SPI device with the Raspberry Pi” but your codes only for output. Can you also show how to read an input from the SPI device. eg STEDI16Px (http://www.smarthardware.eu/manual/stedi16px_doc.pdf)

  • Mercury November 30, 2016 at 10:53 pm

    Great little article … thanks, it was helpful. I wasn’t sure how to contact you other than writing this post to inform you of a mistake on your about blurb. Developer is mentioned twice. “a Java EE developer developer at Cargill, … “

    • Takaitra December 9, 2016 at 6:21 pm

      Fixed! That bio was a couple of years out of date. Thanks for letting me know.

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