The DRV2665 device includes a 100-byte FIFO for real-time haptic waveform playback. The FIFO mode accepts 8-bit digital haptic waveform data over an I²C compatible bus and writes it into an on-chip FIFO. The data is read out of the FIFO automatically at an 8-kHz sampling rate and fed into a digital-to-analog converter (DAC). The DAC then drives the high-voltage amplifier. This mode is utilized when the user writes directly to the I²C FIFO entry address (0x0B). When the first data byte is written to the FIFO, the device goes through the proper start-up sequence and begins outputting the waveform automatically. An internal timing sequence waits approximately 2 ms before the first data is sent through the DAC and output by the device. It is important that the data values start and end at or near the mid-scale code (0x00) to avoid large steps at the beginning and end of the waveform. When the FIFO is empty, the device waits for the timeout period , and then enters into an idle state.

Because the speed of the serial interface could be faster than the read-out rate of the FIFO, the device does not acknowledge, or NAK, if the FIFO is full during a FIFO write transaction. If at any time the FIFO becomes completely full, the FIFO_FULL bit is set. When in this condition, the FIFO cannot accept more data without overwriting previous data that has not yet been played. If this occurs, the user must wait until data has had a chance to empty from the FIFO before sending more data. The data must be re-sent starting at the byte that received a NAK.

Any multi-byte I²C write to the FIFO register is treated as a continuous write to the FIFO. Multi-byte writes are preferred for optimum performance. The FIFO interprets the incoming data as twos complement. This means the maximum full-scale code is 0x7F, the maximum negative voltage is 0x80, and the mid-scale is 0x00.