@MITJA BLAZINSEK - So I built my first Sensebender Micro this weekend and it works great. Radio works at distance (>10Meters). Advertises temp and hum at proper intervals. Plus battery level occasionally. And I can update the firmware via Arduino IDE (v1.8.1) and USB. Everyone's path and experience is different so here's what I did.

The build was simple. I just added the socket for the radio. Oh and a piece of right angle pin header for the FTDI interface.

For powering I currently use a FTDI Basic 3v3 from Sparkfun. Provides power plus USB serial for programming and debugging. I have a few 2xAAA cell holders on order for powering from battery.

Once built I also plugged in a radio. I have tried the generic NRF24 low and high power versions with no problems either way. The high power is the PA LNA type with the external antenna. The low power is what is in the picture down below.

Setting up the Arduino IDE was a bit of a chore but the instructions at > link < are very good.

At the end make sure you use the Boards Manager to install the MySensors AVR Boards (add MySensors to the search) so you can choose the "Sensebender Micro" as your 'board'. This last step isn't explicitly mentioned on the link. If that board isn't selected your results will be disappointing. I know from experience.

For the MySensors library be sure to install the latest release which is 2.2.0. I had to use the drop down list for the MySensors library in the Library Manager to install that version. But I l already had a lower version installed, plus a development release installed manually, and this was right around the official 2.2.0 release date, so who knows.

I run Windows 7 Professional SP1 and the Arduino IDE version 1.8.1. Updating the firmware via USB works fine. I have not tried OTA updates yet though I plan to. That should be interesting.

Your mileage may vary. I hope this helps anyone dipping their toe for the first time.

-d

So cool that the micro as a node reports its battery level to the UI (I'm still on the FTDI power, hence > 100%)

-d

@dklinkman said in Sensebender Gateway:

Sensebender

And I got a Sensebender Micro soldered up and running also!! Just temp and humid so far. Too cool

--edit-- picture

So I got my hands on a Sensebender Gateway board and soldered it up. Wow, very nice. No errors like I was seeing on the Uno. Using a generic W5100 for Ethernet and a generic PA+LNA NRF24 radio. Plus all the remote nodes have now been fitted with a generic NRF24 base board for better supply and filtering.

When I get those purportedly better radios from China I'll probably still try them on the Uno. But at this point it's like, what's the point? I have my gateway. Half the size of the rpi, and roughly 2/3 the size of the Uno. No brainer.

I posed a picture if interested. I highly recommend the Sensebender Gateway.

-d

Just got my Sensebender GW and soldered it up. Adapted the serial sketch to Ethernet and it almost worked. Found some posts on this topic that helped me locate and fix my config error. Now all is well. Thanks! --edit-- added photo

-d

It's a holiday in the US for financial services (who I work for as an IT architect) so I'm actually off today and can work on this head scratcher a bit. Back to work tomorrow.

On the Uno gateway I tried moving the radio to the hardware SPI, and uncommented the

// W5100 Ethernet module SPI enable (optional if using a shield/module that manages SPI_EN signal)
#define MY_W5100_SPI_EN 4

since I am actually using an Ethernet shield. I thought that might work but it didn't. The radio is apparently not accessible. I attached a digital scope and I see traffic on SPI, but it may just be the Ethernet. My scope decodes the SPI, but I don't recognize anything in the decoding. But granted, I have no clue.

Wanting to try something different I took a different Uno, a different radio, and made a copy of the sensor node that I made on the Nano. So basically I have two sensor nodes, one on Uno (ID 101) and one on the original Nano (ID 102). The only difference, literally, is the Nano is on a small breadboard. Both have 8" flying leads to the radio. Capacitors at the radios. Everything is within 14" to 24" apart on my floor. In this scenario the RPi/Ethernet is the gateway.

Good news is it all works. I reset my Vera. Was able to include the two new nodes and two new sensors with no problem. Only had to tweak the door sensors on the Vera a little bit to get the arming switch to work. It's all good.

BUT, The debug on the Uno/Sensor node shows NACK errors just like the Uno/Ethernet gateway did. Not as many, but some. See below.

 __  __       ____
|  \/  |_   _/ ___|  ___ _ __  ___  ___  _ __ ___
| |\/| | | | \___ \ / _ \ `_ \/ __|/ _ \| `__/ __|
| |  | | |_| |___| |  __/ | | \__ \  _  | |  \__ \
|_|  |_|\__, |____/ \___|_| |_|___/\___/|_|  |___/
        |___/                      2.2.0-rc.2

17 MCO:BGN:INIT NODE,CP=RNNNA---,VER=2.2.0-rc.2
26 MCO:BGN:BFR
27 TSM:INIT
29 TSF:WUR:MS=0
35 TSM:INIT:TSP OK
37 TSF:SID:OK,ID=2
39 TSM:FPAR
75 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-255-255,s=255,c=3,t=7,pt=0,l=0,sg=0,ft=0,st=OK:
602 TSF:MSG:READ,0-0-2,s=255,c=3,t=8,pt=1,l=1,sg=0:0
607 TSF:MSG:FPAR OK,ID=0,D=1
2082 TSM:FPAR:OK
2083 TSM:ID
2084 TSM:ID:OK
2086 TSM:UPL
2123 !TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=24,pt=1,l=1,sg=0,ft=0,st=NACK:1
2129 TSF:MSG:READ,0-0-2,s=255,c=3,t=25,pt=1,l=1,sg=0:1
2135 TSF:MSG:PONG RECV,HP=1
2138 TSM:UPL:OK
2139 TSM:READY:ID=2,PAR=0,DIS=1
2178 !TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=15,pt=6,l=2,sg=0,ft=0,st=NACK:0100
4189 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=0,t=17,pt=0,l=10,sg=0,ft=1,st=OK:2.2.0-rc.2
4198 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=6,pt=1,l=1,sg=0,ft=0,st=OK:0
4239 TSF:MSG:READ,0-0-2,s=255,c=3,t=6,pt=0,l=1,sg=0:I
4248 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=11,pt=0,l=17,sg=0,ft=0,st=OK:ArduinoDoorSensor
4263 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=12,pt=0,l=11,sg=0,ft=0,st=OK:Version 1.x
4279 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=102,c=0,t=0,pt=0,l=0,sg=0,ft=0,st=OK:
4285 MCO:REG:REQ
4322 !TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=255,c=3,t=26,pt=1,l=1,sg=0,ft=0,st=NACK:2
4329 TSF:MSG:READ,0-0-2,s=255,c=3,t=27,pt=1,l=1,sg=0:1
4334 MCO:PIM:NODE REG=1
4336 MCO:BGN:STP
4337 MCO:BGN:INIT OK,TSP=1
14357 TSF:MSG:SEND,2-2-0-0,s=102,c=1,t=16,pt=2,l=2,sg=0,ft=1,st=OK:1

While the Nano node, also w/ the RPi gateway, shows none. This is getting into my head. I swapped the radios between the Uno node and Nano node and no change. Is it the Uno platform? Should be pretty much the same as Nano/Uno I think. But I'm no expert.

tl;dr -- I have no clue.

Here's the original Nano sensor node

And the new Uno sensor node

This is the Uno gateway node with radio moved to the hardware SPI (which didn't work), It worked before on Uno with the soft SPI. but w/ errors.

So a wealth of information but I have no answers and no more ideas. I'm still trying things but if anyone has an idea why the Uno [seems] to be complicit in causing these NACKs, if only by association, i'm interested. Next I may try a Nano as the gateway. I have a few I just need to solder on some headers. By the weekend at best

--d

So the scope shows clean power and no level fluctuations both during startup and regular operations. 5v rail is at 4.735v and 3v3 rail is steady at 3.245v. There's around 30mv of noise on the 5v rail and negligible noise on the 3v3 rail. The capacitors are still in place across 3v3 at the radios of course.

But I did go ahead and set up a separate 3v3 power supply for the radio. I interconnected the grounds of course. Unfortunately the results are the same. Clean power on the scope, and pretty much the same errors noted in the debug output. The locations of the errors always varies a little. As a control I switched the sensor node back to using the the RPi gateway and zero errors as before. So I'm thinking it isn't power. But good call and I'm glad I checked it out.

--d

@gohan said in NACK Errors w/ Arduino Uno Ethernet Gateway v2.2.0 rc2:

@dklinkman good reports are for the ones from CDEBytes store on aliexpress, I got some of those and so far a performing well

I'll give them a try. Thanks.

--d

The Uno is externally powered with 12v at 2A, but I didn't set up anything separate for the radio. I'll put an analog scope on the 5v power and 3v3 leads and we'll see what it looks like.

Thanks for the suggestion.

--d

Doesn't surprise me. Can you or anyone suggest a reliable or recommended source for this radio?

Thanks.

-d