Due UART ports

Hardware Arduino Due
1

Atmel SAM3X controller has 5 UART ports. The Arduino Due has 4 UARTS.
As I'm designing my own due I'm curious if it is possible to use 5 real hardware UART ports?

The second question is about the usage of the main serial port which is connected to the 16U2 controller.
To use that port I want to be sure that it is disabled from the 16u2 side. I dont want to use MUX to switch between 16u2 and my UART.

Thank you.

2

No the Due has 4 Serial (USART) + 1 HW USB (not the same as serial port) +1 UART

Which ones are you thinking are Serials"?

Mark

3

As I understood from the Atmel specification all USARTs can be configured as an asynchronous operation mode which can be considered as an usual UART.

Didn't find time yet to check how it is possible to do in the Arduino environment.