wifi

468 Articles

FCC Clears The Air With Wi-Fi Software Updates

November 14, 2015 by 33 Comments

A few months ago, the Internet resounded with news that the FCC would ban open source router firmware. This threat came from proposed rules to devices operating in the U-NII bands – 5GHz WiFi, basically. These rules would have required all devices operating in this band to prevent modification to the radio inside these devices. Thanks to the highly integrated architecture of these devices, Systems-on-Chips, and other cost cutting measures from router manufacturers, the fear was these regulations would ultimately prevent modifications to these devices. It’s a legitimate argument, and a number of the keepers of the Open Source flame aired their concerns on the matter.

Now, the FCC has decided to clear the air on firmware upgrades to wireless routers. There was a fair bit of confusion in the original document, given the wording, “how [its] device is protected from ‘flashing’ and the installation of third-party firmware such as DD-WRT.” This appeared to mandate wholesale blocking of Open Source firmware on devices, with no suggestion as to how manufacturers would accomplish this impossible task.

[Julias Knapp], chief of the FCC’s Office of Engineering and Technology has since clarified the Commission’s position. In response to the deluge of comments to the FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, the phrase, ‘protected from flashing… Open Source firmware” has been removed from the upcoming regulation. There’s new, narrow wording (PDF) in this version that better completes the Commission’s goal of stopping overpowered radios without encroching on the Open Source firmware scene. The people spoke, and the FCC listened — democracy at work.

Improving WiFi Throughput With FM Radio

November 11, 2015 by 16 Comments

WiFi networking is one of those things that is reasonably simple to use, but has a lot of complex hidden features (dare we say, hacks) that make it work, or work better. For example, consider the Distributed Coordination Function (DCF) specified in the standard. Before a station can send, it has to listen for a certain time period. If the channel is clear, the station sends. If not, it has to delay a random amount of time before trying again. This is a form of Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) channel management.

Unfortunately, listening time is dead time when–at least potentially–there is no data transmitted on the network. DCF allows you to use various handshaking packets to do virtual carrier detection and ready/clear to send, but these are also less efficient use of bandwidth. There are other optional coordination functions available in the WiFi standard, but they all have their drawbacks.

[Aleksandar Kuzmanovic] at Northwestern University and two of his students have recently published a paper with a new way to coordinate multiple unrelated wireless networks using ubiquitous FM broadcast radio signals called WiFM. Instead of trying to synchronize to the WiFi data channel, this new scheme selects a strong FM radio station that broadcasts Radio Data Service (RDS) data (the data that populates the song titles and other information on modern radios).

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Hackaday Links: November 8, 2015

November 8, 2015 by 8 Comments

[Burt Rutan] is someone who needs no introduction. Apparently, he likes the look of the Icon A5 and is working on his own version.

Earlier this week, the US Air Force lost a few satellites a minute after launch from Barking Sands in Hawaii. This was the first launch of the three stage, solid fueled SPARK rocket, although earlier versions were used to launch nuclear warheads into space. There are some great Army videos for these nuclear explosions in space, by the way.

[Alexandre] is working on an Arduino compatible board that has an integrated GSM module and WiFi chip. It’s called the Red Dragon, and that means he needs some really good board art. The finished product looks good in Eagle, and something we can’t wait to see back from the board house.

The Chippocolypse! Or however you spell it! TI is declaring a lot of chips EOL, and although this includes a lot of op-amps and other analog ephemera (PDF), the hi-fi community is reeling and a lot of people are stocking up on their favorite amplifiers.

[Jeremy] got tired of plugging jumper wires into a breadboard when programming his ATMega8 (including the ‘168 and ‘328) microcontrollers. The solution? A breadboard backpack that fits right over the IC. All the files are available, and the PCB can be found on Upverter.

In case you haven’t heard, we’re having a Super Conference in San Francisco later this week. Adafruit was kind enough to plug our plug for the con on Ask an Engineer last week.

The Latest, Best WiFi Module Has Been Announced

November 6, 2015 by 85 Comments

A little more than a year ago, a new product was released onto the vast, vast marketplace of cheap electronics. It was the ESP8266, and this tiny and cheap WiFi module has since taken over the space of hobbyist electronics and become the de facto standard for connecting tiny microcontrollers to the Internet.

Now there’s an upgrade on the horizon. [John Lee], the public face of Espressif, the makers of the ESP8266, has announced the next product they’re working on. It’s called the ESP32, and if the specs given are correct, it looks to be the next great thing for the Internet of Things.

The ESP32 will now contain two Tensilica processors running at 160MHz, compared to the ‘8266’s one processor running at 80 MHz. The amount of RAM has been increased to 400 kB, Bluetooth LE has been added, WiFi is faster, and there are even more peripherals tucked away in this tiny piece of silicon.

The new ESP32 includes new, simplified APIs and unlike when the ESP8266 was announced, documentation in English.

Right now, Espressif is beta testing the ESP32, with about 200 boards manufactured so far. If you’re one of the few lucky people who have one of these boards on your workbench, we’d love to see your take on it.

Use The Esp As A Serial Adapter

October 23, 2015 by 22 Comments

One of the most useful tools in the hardware hackers toolbox is a USB to serial adapter. With this, you can flash new firmware to routers, and ply the vast binary seas of embedded hardware. The common form of the USB to Serial adapter is an FTDI breakout board. This requires drivers, though, and there is actually a simpler – and wireless – solution: the ESP8266 WiFi module.

Despite being the best little IoT device on the block, the ESP8266 was originally designed to be a USB to WiFi adapter. In our haste to build WiFi throwies, WiFi blinkies, and freaking WiFi server farms, we seem to have forgotten that there’s still a use for a device that turns a 3.3V TTL into a WiFi connection. It’s the perfect device for reflashing a cheap WiFI router with new firmware, or just providing you with wireless serial connections to go along with your wireless Internet.

This project uses jeelabs’ ESP-link firmware for the ESP8266. It’s a simple bridge between WiFi and serial, and can function as an AVR programmer in a pinch. The web interface for this firmware is very nice, but you really don’t need it; the entire purpose of this firmware is to be even more transparent than an FTDI USB to serial adapter. For the next time you’re flashing a router with OpenWRT, don’t bother digging out the USB adapter; an ESP is all you need.

WiFi Fob Acquaints OLED With ESP

October 16, 2015 by 17 Comments

When you think of WiFi in projects it’s easy to get into the rut of assuming the goal is to add WiFi to something. This particular build actually brings WiFi awareness to you, in terms of sniffing what’s going on with the signals around you and displaying them for instant feedback.

[0miker0] is working on the project as his entry in the Square Inch Project. It’s an adapter board that has a footprint for the 2×4 pin header of an ESP8266-01 module, and hosts the components and solder pads for a 128×64 OLED display. These are becoming rather ubiquitous and it’s not hard to figure out why. They’re relatively inexpensive, low-power, high-contrast, and require very few support components. From the schematic in the GitHub Repo it looks like 5 resistors and 7 caps.

The video below shows off two firmware modes so far. The first is an AP scan that reads out some information, the second is a weather-display program. Anyone who’s worked with the ESP modules knows that they have the potential to gather all kinds of data about WiFi signals — one of our favorite demos of this is when [cnlohr] used it to create a 3d light painted map of his WiFi signal strength. Chuck a rechargeable LiPo on this thing, tweak the example code for your needs, and you have a new gadget for wardriving-nouveau.

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Arduino’s Long-Awaited Improved WiFi Shield

October 1, 2015 by 45 Comments

Announced at the 2014 Maker Faire in New York, the latest Arduino WiFi shield is finally available. This shield replaces the old Arduino WiFi shield, while providing a few neat features that will come in very handy for the yet-to-be-developed Internet of Things.

While the WiFi Shield 101 was announced a year ago, the feature set was interesting. The new WiFi shield supports 802.11n, and thanks to a few of Atmel’s crypto chip offerings, this shield is the first official Arduino offering to support SSL.

The new Arduino WiFi Shield 101 features an Atmel ATWINC1500 module for 802.11 b/g/n WiFi connectivity. This module, like a dozen or so other WiFi modules, handles the heavy lifting of the WiFi protocol, including TCP and UDP protocols, leaving the rest of the Arduino free to do the actual work. While the addition of 802.11n  will be increasingly appreciated as these networks become more commonplace, the speed offered by ~n isn’t really applicable; you’re not going to be pushing bits out of an Arduino at 300 Mbps.

Also included on the WiFi shield is an ATECC508A CryptoAuthentication chip. This is perhaps the most interesting improvement over the old Arduino WiFi shield, and allows for greater security for the upcoming Internet of Things. WiFi modules already in the space have their own support for SSL, including TI’s CC3200 series of modules, Particle‘s Internet of Things modules, and some support for the ESP8266.