Solving I2C Address Conflicts - TCA9548A I2C Multiplexer

Today we will resolve a common problem - what to do when two of your sensors or displays have the same I2C address?

I’ve covered the I2C bus in several previous videos, and today we’ll take another look at it. This time I’ll show you how to resolve a common problem - what to do if you need to use two identical sensors or displays that have the same, unalterable, I2C address?

The answer is pretty simple, you implement an additional I2C bus. And you can do this a couple of different ways.

The first way is through software. By using an alternative to the Arduino Wire Library you can implement more than one I2C bus on your Arduino, and you aren’t restricted to using pins A4 and A5.

But software solutions have their drawbacks, and my preferred way of doing this is using hardware.

The Adafruit TCA9548A MI2C Multiplexer Module is perfect for the job. You can use it to add up to 8 additional I2C buses to your Arduino, and you can use up to eight modules for a whopping 64 extra I2C buses!

I’ll restrict myself to one module today. And I’ll use it to drive two identical I2C OLED displays that have a fixed I2C address. I'll build a temperature and humidity meter and send temperature to one display, humidity to the other.

Here is what I have in store for you today:

I2C Address Conflicts - 1:32
Software Solutions - 3:37
TCA9548A I2C Multiplexer - 8:31
Two OLED Demo - 11:52
Bonus Feature - 20:43

So let’s become mediators and end I2C address conflicts once and for all!

[MrGeekGamer]

This is something I have never seen addressed (no pun intended) elsewhere when discussing i2c devices.

[Coolarj]

Every time I see a topic made by DroneBot Workshop, I always rest easy knowing I'm going to find out exactly what I need to know!

[jeefmeen]

Great channel! Thank you for your work and your shared knowledge. Your clear and clear speech makes it possible to understand your explanations for non-English speakers. Thx.

[robertobrenes]

This channel is a treasure, I hope you have backups of everything! Thank you so much for your videos!!!

[maybornelectronics]

DONT HAVE ENOUGH WORDS TO APPRECIATE THE WAY YOU EXPLAIN. THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

[tubeDude]

This was great! It solved an issue I had...Thanks Bill !

[jean-marczenhausern]

I always enjoy your videos. I learn a lot new stuff. Please keep doing such great videos!

[amizan]

This video is so good that at the 4:25 mark, I turned off my ad block and refreshed the page. Thanks for posting!

[dafydds]

Thanks for this great video, I'm so green to all of this, but you're video just explained enough for me to get my TCA9548A. I was worried I would have to re-write other people's imported libraries, but this is a game changer for me!
Thank-you :-)

[harveyellis]

Another great video! Always informative and inspires new ideas for me.

[klif_n]

Another great video. I'm really new to all this micro controller fun, but I'm really enjoying it. Thanks for all the info.

[mazbrenkgaming]

Thanks so much sir. You're even better than my teachers in terms of explaining the materials

[passenger]

thank you for your videos. You give information easy enough to learners and interesting enough to watch for experienced viewers :)

[atilayaksoy]

Dammmmn, exactly what I was looking for for a while. Thank you so much for this extra ordinary info on how to utilize multiple I2C with address conflict... Thunbs up...🙂

[BobFeigl]

Thank you for this content. I mentioned in your other single oled temp/humid sensor video but: If you get a NAN value displaying on one screen, you need to add an additional 2000 ms delay in the code. Pulling both values quickly doesn't work with these temp/humid sensors. They can only be polled once every 2 seconds. Adding that 2 second delay in between both reads fixes the NAN issue.

[pedrorela]

Thanks for the explanation, as always very clear!!!

[hugbearsx]

Excellent teaching. Thank you for your effort!

[robsciuk]

More very high quality work!!!! Well done.

[ACIDBREAKS]

Sir,
I really want to thank you for this video. Really good detailed easy to understand description. Highly appreciated. As for a beginner like me, I can not value ur content high enough.

[AB-skkz]

A lots of informations, well explained
Thank you so much