MAX2830 and Arduino

Projects General Guidance
1

Hi,

I'm looking for a cheaper wifi connection solution for my arduino project. All the wifi ready to use chips are around $30-50 (ie: rn-171 - www.rovingnetworks.com/resources/download/12/RN_171)

I found a cheap ($5.6) ready to use chip made by Maxim: MAX2830 (http://datasheets.maxim-ic.com/en/ds/MAX2830.pdf)

My questions:

  • How can I make sure this chip usable by arduino boards?
  • How can I find/create a library for this chip to use with Arduino boards?

Thanks,
Tuncay

2

Well the first step would be read the datasheet and see how it communicates, what speed, how often and see if the arduino is up to it, you may need a middleman chip to talk to it if its too intensive, maybe not
once you figure out how it works, the library should be easy if you have done it before, if not try making a simple library first

3

A quick look over seems if you want a wifi frequency radio connection then its great and I don't see why an arduino couldn't do it , if your looking for a whole internet connection you'll need that middle man chip that knows how to handle that kind of stuff to simplify it for the arduino

4

the datasheet for the max2830 is not very helpful for those mainly experienced with microcontrollers. To interface the max2830 you need two RX ADCs and two TX DACs just to convert the modulation into digital data. Wifi uses QPSK. Here is some info:
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Communication_Systems/Phase_Modulation

I am also looking for info on how to build a wifi module that can interface to a microcontroller. Only after achieving this can anyone really use these modules. Unfortunately, the makers such as MAXIM and UBEC seem to either not understand this need for application info or they don't know how to use their own modules in a practical environment.

If anyone can at least give us the info that takes us from the rf module to a digital interface then we could continue from there and get something working.