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21

Thanks for the suggestion. I was aware of both TI 2530 line and STM32W. The most important factor to me is certification. I don’t have the resource to go through FCC certification. The break even point suggested by TI is 100K unit/year. STM32W is quite attempting. As I mentioned earlier. the price from an Asian vendor can even beat Z-wave. The modules are FCC approved even. The problem on my hand is, those modules don’t work as reliable as Xbee. So right now, xbee might be still the best choice for me.

22

@ Jerome

Can you please provide the name of Asian vendor,who’s modules based on TI 253x chipset is not stable?

23

OK I got an answer from SD.
Nothing for the hobbyist. The guy just suggest me the RaZberry solution (it’s just a gateway if I understand), and gently escaped my trap (“I heard rumours that SD is thinking about opening more their SDK for personal use…”).

So now I’m hesitating. Buy the USB key :

Or spend 90€ for a RaZberry kit and use my NETMF board to communicate with it…

24

Did any of you guys proceed with any of these exciting technologies?

25

For me, I gave up using z-wave.

Now I’m waiting my EnOcean usb key. They provide a full dev documentation, and it’s easy to read/write data.

And their solution seems very interesting, specially for the power consumption.

26

Hmm, and within reach http://www.futureelectronics.com/en/technologies/development-tools/rf-wireless/Pages/5033687-S3004-X350.aspx?IM=0

27

Btw what was the reason to ditch z-wave?

28

Very simple. No documentation available, unless you paid 1500$ for the SDK, nothing for any embedded hardware (yeah except the Raspberry), no community.

The product is not made for hobbyists.

29

I have played around with Insteon for similar home control interfaces.

My whole home is updated with Insteon (lights, thermostat, Garage door, Video monitor, remote control, etc). It is cheaper than Z-Wave and Zigbee (in my research) and much more reliable than X10 (which I used before with no success). I have found it very reliable as long as you have enough modules. Mesh network using both RF and Powerline, so the more modules the more reliable.

It has a number of control products for USB, Serial and http and the protocol info can be found. You can also sign up as a developer which is free.

I don’t think you could easily make a Gadgeteer module, but I have experimentally interfaced via Serial to a Panda II. I expect USB Host would work as well. Making my own controller is on my list to do. Someday. In the mean time I continue to use an off-the-shelf controller.

Find more at www.insteon.com.

1 Like
30

Hi everybody.

My company developed a .NETMF targeted managed Z-Wave stack covering most profiles (basic, meter, binary and multilevel sensor, multilevel switch, thermostat, etc).

Client library is designed in order to drive stock Z-Wave Serial API controller firmware (provided by Sigma Designs within their SDK) running on both OEM and “appliance” off-the shelf controllers, such as this one: http://zwaveit.com/controllers/pcadapterzwave/ZME_Serial

Just to give you a better picture of intended use, here it is a short test that toggles a lamp (specifically a Z-Wave node with NodeID=4) one time per second:

private static void testBasicSetEnh()
        {
            IFullDuplexChannel channel = DependencyResolver.GetSerialPortFullDuplexChannel("COM1", 115200);
            IFrameManager frameManager = DependencyResolver.GetSerialApiFrameManager(channel);
            IBasicDeviceController controller = DependencyResolver.GetSerialApiFifoController(frameManager);

            channel.Start();

            bool toggler = false;

            while (true)
            {
                controller.SetAsync((byte)0x04, toggler ? (byte)0x01 : (byte)0x00,
                    () => checkok(),
                    (ex) => checkko(ex)
                    );

                toggler = !toggler;

                Thread.Sleep(1000);
            }
        }

At this time it is not clear whether my company will ever provide library code as open source, so if you are interested in using it in commercial applications please contact me at maiorfi “at” innovactive “dot” it

Concerning real-world use cases for this library, it is currently used in a Z-Wave/MQTT bridge firmware (available also for ZigBee stack) targeted to .NETMF devices that (on a Mountaineer Eth board with .NETMF 4.3.1 beta 3) has been running 24/7 without hiccups for more than 6 months :slight_smile:

BTW, we are also developing a GAP/GATT client/server stack targeted to TI-CC254x BLE chips. Probably we’ll publish some details about it on tinyclr.it web site on first half of September.