I'm currently in the initial phase of developing a mesh network for P10 dot matrix displays, and I find myself uncertain about which ESP32 module would be the most suitable choice for my project also consider the compatibility with the mesh libraries. I would greatly appreciate any assistance or guidance in this regard.
Check the library documentation, which controllers they support.
With ESP32 there is only one controller, but dozens of boards. I don't know how they really differ, except for 30/38 pins.
But after all I agree that the chosen ESP32 has to be supported by the libraries. Also check the library date of last update. I was suggested a library that was not updated for 6 years and could not be loaded into the IDE.
You can do a dry run with a test program for all libraries, then compile for the selected board and switch the board until at least everything compiles without errors.
thank you for replay @DrDiettrich @Railroader .
if basic ESP32 module provides 32 GPIOs are they enough for the 8 boards mesh network.
besides of GPIO i also need a good wifi range.. so which one board will be best suited for me.
GPIOs are quite unimportant. All connected modules will use their own interfaces (Serial, I2C, SPI...) which have reserved pins. Check the pin map of the modules for the number of interfaces and ports they provide.
I just checked the advertisement of my ESP32 board:
- GPIO-Pins: 68 (34 auf jeder Seite)
What's absolute nonsense because each side of the board has only 15 pins. The highest GPIO number on the board is D34, with many missing numbers in between.
@DrDiettrich you are 100% right ..that's the main reason I got confused as I visited many sites regarding this ..... as of now im thinking simple ESP32 board will be enough...
Right, newer boards will typically have 38 pins. Have you had a look already at the long list of ESP32 boards supported by the IDE? Locate your board there before buying!
I have a few with 38-pins, comparing it with a 30-pin version i realized that the extra pins on mine are 6 pins that can not really be used because they are connected to 'flash memory' 1 extra GND pin, and GPIO 0 (boot) is exposed as well. This is how little they effectively differ. There are S2 , S3 & C3 variants, which actually are different though.
@Deva_Rishi thank you for reply...yes sure I will ..is there any genuine comparison you got ? or any site you refer in situation like this.
No i just compared pinout diagrams, i have only the standard versions, but you could dive into the datasheets. I had to look up 'P10' display, looks like that is a SPI device. The amount of pins available on the board really isn't all that important, but getting SPI connected properly on an ESP32 can be a bit tricky if you don't know what you are doing. What is it you are actually attempting to do ?
@Deva_Rishi
thank you response...
Im working on the one of petrol Companies existing digital signage project .. you may have looked it outside the petrol pumps.. the existing signage standee if it contains 8 separate p10 display combination then it requires to update the values of parameters by connecting each display unit but i want to send data to the all controllers from one controller instead of connecting each of them.
you will better understand from the simple sketch...... similar combination of p10 also from backside. consider inner boxes as a p10 display combination
Well as from the datatsheet you can connect up to 3 SPI devices per SPI bus on an ESP32, and there are 2 SPI busses available per ESP32, though not all libraries can make use of them.
here is a fairly good explaination of what can be done on the SPI busses on an ESP32, but of course every library may have it's own quicks, same as any dev board you may be trying to use. In the end, testing will have to be done to see what works. You may be able to go over that 3 device limit, i just don't know. It would be so much easier not to do a mesh thing, but just use a single board for output.
@Deva_Rishi thank you for reply ..i will go through the link .... but if we used the single controller to drive all p10 there would be much complicated connections need to made as there is very large p10 already cascaded with FRC cable in single box ...i have one idea can i use esp32 as master and send it to other controller esp8266 which is used to drive the each p10 combination via there mesh.