@NeverDie Yep, that rocket stuff, and that dedication-to-task stuff, is pretty cool. Thanks for sharing - very inspirational.

At a more modest level ... I received the Atmega 328P programming harness/clamp you recommended long ago. Nice. And your barebones board loaded with my RFM69HCW jig are working nicely. Also received: a bunch of your suggested radios and the carrying boards. Time, I need time. Can't thank you and @alphaHotel enough for the encouragement. I look forward to reporting if only to chronical for my own record and possible use for others.

I hope it doesn't take me 7 years, but it may. Now all I need is a bunch of 48 hour days.

@NeverDie said in Anyone using/tried the E28-2G4M27S 2.4Ghz LoRa SX1280 27dB module?:

ey'd have a different ISP, or, if not, can at least pass your traffic to someone else on the LoRaWAN who has a different ISP than you. If you were also running Amazon Sidewalk, then you'

@NeverDie. Thanks for your write-up. Before I lose my train of thought and go look at StuartsProjects I have to ask about the EasyEDA design: doesn't it make TX/RX much better with no groundplane around the antenna? I've just completed a 433 MHz project and found that I was better to get the TX side way off my groundplaned board. Also, I've noticed that other ESP8266 breakouts dutifully remove the groundplane from breakout boards that would be near the ESP's built-in PCB antenna.

I don't know much about radio's so can easily accept any comment for the better, or even ridicule. I've learned as much as I can about radios from Andreas Spiess. He would simply test the difference with a RF sensor.

@NeverDie said in Most reliable "best" radio:

would last... ready for it?.... 1,537 years!

Have you considered comedy as a profession? I love your postings. The self-discharge of the human is another limitation. Unless, of course, you have a couple of Methuselahs in your progeny and a good set of instructions. And I know you can write good ones.
Thanks for the post.

@NeverDie said in Most reliable "best" radio:

What all does the elder care entail? If it's just supervision, maybe you can provide it using your automation skills.

Thanks for asking. Yea, I thought of assigning a robot to the task of caring for my mother, but then I would be cast to the dungeon of my own making. Broken-hip, surgery, Rehab, Discharge - it is complicated and demanding. Fortunately we have skilled nursing and CNA's to do the bulk of the hard work. But getting mom's 'extended' taxes done, pain management intervention, arranging for PT, OT, Surgeon follow-up, rehab facility discharge, hemotologists, PCP's and where to land... it is a full time job. And then there is emotional support visits for the patient, my mom, while stress among sibilings and spouses becomes damaging. We all live too long.

Yea, programming radios is my relief: develop, test, then correct. Far less human, and far more certain and way more fun. And when you are done for the day... you simply go to sleep. Sweet!

I've been rereading this thread this evening. I'm glad for the record as I can relearn - even from myslef. So many great ideas that need further work by me. My 433 ASK transmitters are now controlled by 328P chips because the transmit times can be limited to 200 mS at about 6mA. I know, some of your radios can transmit faster but I'm just now divorcing my HT12E and HT12D chips and that is going to take time. Baby steps.

On my new config (Barebones/SR501 motion detector/433 transmitor, the sleep current seems to be about 62 uA and that supports the SR501 motion detectors. That power dominates the energy profile of the device and is near the shelf-discharge of the battery - so it doesn't deserve much study. But the speed of the radio transmission does warrent further study since that is the high current period.

@NeverDie. Thanks for the comment. I'm not sure if I've got that ground-plane radio interferance thing right. Maybe there is a SMD socket thing in which a radio could be clipped so you don't have to commit a radio to the board to find out. I've not seen one but I've not looked. Maybe it is time to invent one with springs to receive castellated edges. A jig like that would also serve ESP8266's. I like the PTH sockets for this kind of experimentation.
The idea of sawing off the top just north of the TXEN/RXEN connections is good. Maybe you could do that after mounting so you could test before AND after. That would be definitive.
On the other hand a redesign and reorder from OSHPark can't be that much of a setback. I really enjoy their service. They happen to be less than 5 miles from my home - but they ship globally. Small world.
Let me know what you learn. I'll learn with you much as I have been doing with hundreds of your other posts - and I thank you.

@NeverDie Sorry to bother again... but I gotta say this Hartley traning video has been monumental. I always thought the world was divided into AC and DC. NOW, I think I get it: DC circuits flipping on and off at a SIGNAL frequency are actually AC just with a different voltage basis. The KEY, Hartley says, is that the energy is not in the trace, but in the field during the rise and fall of voltage. This is also helping me to finally understand inductance. WHY didn't they say this 40 years ago in school? Oh, perhaps I was sleeping as I did.
This is a breakthrough that may lead me to understanding antennae theory and a bunch of other stuff. I thank you for the introduction. I gotta go find this Hartley fellow to thank him.

@NeverDie said in Anyone using/tried the E28-2G4M27S 2.4Ghz LoRa SX1280 27dB module?:

Anyhow, if you find out anything more, I'd be interested.

Eric Bogatin, master and professor of signal integrity, gave this presentation at an Altuim conference. At about 42:00 he talks about 7 Habits of Good Design. This, again, has more to do with PCB design and not radio performance. I have a suspicion that several radio boards I designed failed not because of the transmitter, but because of bad PCB design. I can make a failed transmitter (whip antennae) board work by putting the 433 MHz transmitter on a 7" leash away from the board. Now that is a sign.

@ejlane - Thanks. I'm just now learning of the EMI/EMC testing required for commercial products and FCC requirements. While that exceeds the requirements and budget for my home projects, I do think that I might employ the pre EMI testing that one can do with a scope and probes. That may drive me back to school to learn scopes!

@ejlane & @NeverDie: Amazing technology that was available for $1 was … too hard to believe. Even $5 for a ProMini is pretty mind-blowing. Not that I buy commodities, I do buy these components a dozen at a time to save on shipping even when it is ‘free’. I laugh at myself when I spend a week of my time on a $2 chip and then wonder how I can rework it from a PCB (never worth the attempt). Compared to any other hobby or habit this radio-electronic stuff is cheaper than cooking top-ramen at home.
BTW, thanks for the radio discussion posted last week. I will read and learn later.

@NeverDie, Thanks again for all the blogging on this subject. If you have not yet ordered your custom low-noise PCB, I had one design idea. If you flip the ProMini orientation end over end most of the traces will be shorter, especially the RX/TX lines. I’ve not examined the code, but I’d think that the RX/TX connections have the most signal activity on the board, thus EMI potential. I like how you keep all the traces on one side. That should solve the interrupted ground-plane problem we learned from Rick Hartley above.

It is far more fun to roll-your-own. Alternatively, I was thinking … I just checked the Moteino breakout boards from Felix at LowerPowerLabs to see if those would work with your Ebyte radios: too bad, different pinout. I just bought a few Moteinos (915 mhz) boards to save myself from my low-quality solder jobs and shaky hands – only $13 but I have to add my own radio or spend another $7. Everything I've seen from LowPowerLabs has been high quality.

@NeverDie. You are way out there, man! Thanks to the references to the other boards made by you. What fantastic contributions to the maker market.
I suppose D20 and D21 are the same as PCINT6/XLTAL1 and PCINT7/XTAL2? I once reassigned RX and TX on an Attiny85 to RX and TX (edit: output functions) as I was pin limited. It took some doing, but that is the beauty of these multifunction pin assignments. The code, if I remember, had to be in the loop after a delay in the setup; that gave me a way to access the RX/TX pins again to reprogram if necessary. Maybe there are similar challenges with bypassing the crystal.
@samh. So you are setting power levels on the fly. Very clever.

@NeverDie: Yes, as you describe elswere, and taught me, the design trade-off parameters are frequency, bandwith, dwell time, bit transfer rate, power demand, and most importantly, range. I'm looking forward to your findings.

Regarding the low reciever current: don't know about the FOB's but I have found the transmitter power to be key. My design has the "always on" reciever connected to mains. so I don't worry about that power. But the battery-limited transmitter devices are brought to life and triggered by the signal pin of the SR501 sensors that is high enough, long enough to complete a transmission, or several. The HT12E (encoder) chip is connected to the SR501 pin is fired and sends the settings of the dip-switch pin hi/low settings that is recieved by the always-on HT12d (decoder) that the Atmega 328PU can understand. I think the HT devices are MCUs in a different form, like what I imagine a FPLC to be like... don't know for sure. Why do I drone on? Because of the HT12D and HT12E pariings are very specific and very low on power demand due to their design. When I built my configuration (6 years ago) I knew more than I do now. But I'm relearning more. Andreas Spiess, Great Scott, Big Clive, and YOU, explore this stuff extensively, and I thank you all.

In summary, my repeaters and base RX station are mains powered so I don't worry about power & batteries. The primary focus for conservation of batteries is on the TX/Motion devices. Everything downstream of TX is mains powered or can be suitably backed up in the short term.

@NeverDie Yes, you are correct: the HT12D datasheet indicates that multiple signals must be recieved before the enable pin is activated. I think the 'multiple' is a count of three and there is probably a preamble in advance of the main message of high/low settings. The transmitter, again I think, just keeps sending the message until the SR501 drops power (2 seconds on the minimum settings). I get alot of double hits because of this. Good to know about the noise and history. Thanks.

@NeverDie : Very interesting stuff. Even at the lowly 8MHz, the speed of processing pretty much blows away the human concept of time. Fun to hear of the Raspberry and Due. I’ll have to play with those.

HT12D/HT12E: Yes, I learned that the processing could be done on a MCU and I did that on the repeaters I built. I put a Pro-Mini in between a 433 Mhz RX and TX. This repeater sits and listens in the RX mode until it is pinged with a transmission from one of the 433-HT12E detectors. Once a message comes in, the MCU then switches to TX mode and passes the message along, then reverts to listening again. The repeaters and the base station are mains powered as I figured the always ON state would be a battery killer whereas the 433-HT12E’s are very low power and outfitted with batteries.

Rather than using the IIRC library I used RCSwitch – probably because I found that first. RadioHead was another option. The biggest challenge for me was learning which protocol to use for the 433 radios. The command mySwitch.setProtocol(11); did the trick.

@NeverDie Yes, the experience and knowledge found by doing (measuring) is always deeper,

Forgot to mention: Kevin Darah. I have bought several of his TrigBoards. I find the price to be a good value for the design, components, assembly, and all the content he has posted. The quality of his boards is great. I am a Patreon of his. I just need to play with the TrigBoards some more.

@NeverDie said in Anyone using/tried the E28-2G4M27S 2.4Ghz LoRa SX1280 27dB module?:

I wouldn't say the PPK2 is good at measuring <1ua currents though, such as sleep currents. If that matters to you, you'll want a Current Ranger, or TinyCurrents or similar.

I'd say the PPK2 is the way to go. Your other post defines the <1ua current as ... nearly infinite in human terms and battery self-discharge rates. Squeezing a stone can yield no more water. Thanks for the posts, once again.

@NeverDie
For me, it is one step at a time.
PPKII: Bought one! I'm back ordered at DigiKey and expect delivery in early June. I'll have to wait on the uCurrent or CurrentRanger until I get a scope. ... I know, the SSD screen on the CurentRanger and a bit of math would suffice. I may get there. Sounds it sound like you have already settled on the best-radio, so your test-rig may be for naught. If you need help, and the PPKII is sufficient, let me know. I am indebted to you for your work.

@NeverDie Wow, that was fast. I just found it. Thanks. I'm on the bus.

@NeverDie Thanks again. I've downloaded both and am putting together a BOM to send to DigiKey. Hopefully I'll sneek an order in with my back-ordered PPKII. I'm sure I'll have lots of questions. The Assembly plant I use allows one-side component placement. I'll have to choose one and it will probably be the sole 386p chip. I've never come close to soldering that fine of pitch. Surely it would be a mess.

@NeverDie said in Anyone using/tried the E28-2G4M27S 2.4Ghz LoRa SX1280 27dB module?:

We've barely scratched the surface of what can be done.

Openhardware.io gift coming. Please use it to replace your missing uCurrentGold with the proceeds. Someday I’ll contribute my own projects to these splendid forums, I hope.

@NeverDie said in Most reliable "best" radio:

All this time the ESP8266 had been type-cast as impossibly power hungry. I guess the main downside is that anything in addition that one might do, such as measuring the battery voltage or doing an TH measurement, as examples, will be done at a fairly high current burnrate.

By turning off the 8266's radio and only using the CPU for TH, voltage, or any other measurement, considerable power savings result. I think I was getting down to the mid-teens of mA, instead of the 70 mA or so with the radio on. Another power savings came to me by saving up periodic readings, in like a table. Then every 50th reading, or so, turn radio back on and do a bulk-load to whatever database is desired, then turn off the radio and go to sleep. It was a kick to learn how to do this. Here is a posting I did at mathworks with more detail as it relates to loading to Thingspeak: https://www.mathworks.com/support/search.html/answers/890382-how-to-efficiently-transfer-bulk-upload-from-an-esp8266-to-thingspeak.html?fq[]=asset_type_name:answer&fq[]=category:thingspeak/write-data&page=1
I've seen several other uses of the ESP that exclude radio use and just implement the CPU.