- Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:25 pm
#80772
Hey all, I'm looking for some advice about wireless solutions.
I'm looking to create a handful of networked devices that would be used in a wooded area. The size of the wooded area is about 30 acres, but designing for something larger, say 50 acres, would be preferable.
The devices would all need the ability to communicate with a central host, but not necessarily directly (some protocols might support some sort of "daisy chaining" or packet forwarding features, which is fine). The devices also don't need to be able to push large amounts of data, just simple status notifications and the like.
I was looking at using Zigbee, and the XBee Pro sports 100mW power, claiming 15mile range (best case, LOS, I would assume). I've never used the Zigbee protocol, but the protocol doesn't matter so much to me, cost (assuming the range I need) is the main driving factor.
Perhaps using the Nordic chips with an amplifier would also work? Again, this just drives up the cost, but the Nordic chips are fairly cheap to begin with.
Thanks for any suggestions!
-Nate
====
Looks like the Nordic chips are a dead end, not very easy to add an external PA.
Perhaps some sort of ARM core with integrated 802.15.4 would be a better solution...
I'm looking to create a handful of networked devices that would be used in a wooded area. The size of the wooded area is about 30 acres, but designing for something larger, say 50 acres, would be preferable.
The devices would all need the ability to communicate with a central host, but not necessarily directly (some protocols might support some sort of "daisy chaining" or packet forwarding features, which is fine). The devices also don't need to be able to push large amounts of data, just simple status notifications and the like.
I was looking at using Zigbee, and the XBee Pro sports 100mW power, claiming 15mile range (best case, LOS, I would assume). I've never used the Zigbee protocol, but the protocol doesn't matter so much to me, cost (assuming the range I need) is the main driving factor.
Perhaps using the Nordic chips with an amplifier would also work? Again, this just drives up the cost, but the Nordic chips are fairly cheap to begin with.
Thanks for any suggestions!
-Nate
====
Looks like the Nordic chips are a dead end, not very easy to add an external PA.
Perhaps some sort of ARM core with integrated 802.15.4 would be a better solution...