Microchip expands wireless solutions

5 August 2009 Telecoms, Datacoms, Wireless, IoT

Microchip has announced two additions to its IEEE802.15.4 and ZigBee portfolio for short-range, low data-rate embedded wireless networking.

The MRF24J40MB is Microchip’s second 2,4 GHz RF surface-mounted transceiver module, and adds +20 dBm of receive sensitivity via the integrated low noise amplifier (LNA) to the proven IEEE802.15.4 compliant transceiver, PCB antenna and discrete matching circuitry. More transmit power allows designers to expand the range of their IEEE802.15.4 based ZigBee or proprietary-protocol wireless networks.

The module approach eliminates RF design time, expertise and expense, while accelerating time to market and mitigating development risk. This module is pending agency certification, which is another time and cost saving measure. Microchip enables designers to combine this module with the microcontroller memory, performance and peripherals from among hundreds of its 8-, 16- and 32-bit PIC microcontrollers (MCUs) and dsPIC digital signal controllers (DSCs).

On the software side, Microchip’s newly certified ZigBee PRO protocol stack provides another option for IEEE 802.15.4-based wireless networks using Microchip’s PIC MCUs. The combination of Microchip’s ZigBee PRO stack, the MRF24J40 transceiver radio or transceiver modules, and any of its 16-bit PIC24 MCUs or dsPIC33 DSCs forms Microchip’s ZigBee PRO Compliant Platform, as certified by the ZigBee Alliance.

In addition to providing the ZigBee protocol stacks, designers who do not require interoperability or large-node networks can save on certification and microcontroller memory costs by utilising Microchip’s free and proprietary MiWi and MiWi P2P IEEE 802.15.4-based protocol stacks.

Designers can integrate the MRF24J40MB transceiver module with the appropriate 16-bit PIC24 MCUs, dsPIC DSCs and 32-bit PIC32 MCUs, by purchasing the new MRF24J40MB PICtail Plus daughter board, designed to plug into the Explorer 16 Modular Development Board, which has available processor plug-in modules for all of Microchip’s 16- and 32-bit families.

Additionally, the ZENA Wireless Network Analyser is available to graphically display wireless network traffic, analyse the complete network traffic and graphically display decoded packets.

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