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Wi-Fi

See also the IoT Wi_Fi discovery kit in Tutorials.

Introduction

Networking based on TCP/IP requires a considerable overhead and some specialist hardware. This can be achieved with the current PIC32 processors running at 80MHz with a low cost physical (hardware) link. Some also have this hardware built in and so all that is needed is the line matching (impedance) arrangements, known as magnetics.

However a much better arrangement is for the PIC to the the microcontroller work - ADC, I/O PWM etc. and let a dedicated process or all of the relevant TCP/IP firmware take care of networking. Currently there are two contenders for this:

  1. The Hi-link modules that have a built in Linux operating system, these are reliable and also have more than one UART so potentially the ByPic could be re-programmed remotely.
  2. The ESP8266 module. This is a dedicated Wi-Fi module - no operating system and very low cost. It is limited compared to the Hi-Link module but because it does not have an operating system the start up time is considerably quicker.

Why Wi-Fi

This is a personal preference and I could be wrong but I think that at some point in time the old wired RJ45 system will become a bit pointless for small and domestic networks. For this reason the cost of adding additional the hardware seems counter productive.