Wifi for Panda II

NETMF & Gadgeteer
1

Any recommendations for a quick and cheap Wifi module for use with the Panda II, I see the WiFi-Ethernet Bridge but that needs to configured from the a PC.

[ulist]I need to be able to configure it from the Panda II (using touch screen) [/ulist]
[ulist]Open a TCP/IP socket to my server[/ulist]
[ulist]Run a web server, on either the Panda or the module[/ulist]

I see Sparkfun’s GainSpan WiFi Breakout (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10505) and the raw module (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10808)
as well as the RN-XV WiFly Module (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10822)

Thanks

2

Welcome to the community.

All these WiFi solutions are basically serial-wifi bridges and so they all should work with panda serial port.

3

I find working with the serial WiFi boards to be a real pain.

I would suggest getting an Ethernet shield and a Ethernet to WiFi bridge
like GHI sells. The cost will be around the same, but the implementation
challenges will be less.

I believe there are several web server code examples on this site.

4

There is a wifly driver on the code site : http://code.tinyclr.com/project/168/sparkfun-wifly-shield-with-fez-domino/

:slight_smile:

5

You might want to look for WIFI (UART?) boards that have the possibility of working with AT commands. Some devices, which have settings, can be changed over serial communication by sending a certain frequency of bytes or codes if you will. Known as AT commands (Some background information: Hayes command set - Wikipedia).

That way you do not need another computer in between to configure the settings.
I have not searched for a WIFI board with these kind of commands integrated, so I cannot advise you one in particular.

6

I have a Fez Connect Shield (I assume that’s same thing as the Ethernet Shield mentioned), and I am comfortable with AT commands (but would prefer something less low level).

Thanks Nicolas3, I saw the SparkFun Wifi Shield (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9367), but I was concerned by it’s retired status which is fine for prototyping and demoing (so long as I can get hold of one). Was it just replaced with a newer model (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9954)?

I suspected that running two shields was a No No, without some hardware reconfiguration, but looking at the layouts I think maybe it is possible.