which w5500 shield to buy: need advice

Using Arduino Networking, Protocols, and Devices
#1

I'm looking to buy an Ethernet shield for my uno r3.

the w5100 is cheap to buy but slow. I'm looking to buy a w5500 shield.

My budget is low and I need advice on which I should buy.

This kind for around 10$us :
http://www.ebay.com/itm/SPI-to-Ethernet-Shield-W5500-Network-Expansion-Board-Replace-W5100-For-Arduino-/291495860309?hash=item43de81d855

or this kind for around 25$us:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/POE-W5500-Ethernet-Shield-Micro-SD-Socket-for-Arduino-/371341174777?hash=item5675a8a7f9

Is someone already tried the first one and it is worth it ?

THX

#2

Is someone already tried the first one and it is worth it ?

What makes you think this ethernet shield will fix what ever problem you are having?

#3

I do not own an Ethernet shield yet, I'm planning my next project and wish to have a good Ethernet shield but my budget is low so need to find a good price.

I red the w5500 is faster than the w5100, so my page can show up faster (wish to have a lot of stuff on that page).

The first w5500 shield of my last post have a low price but I wish to know if it will do the same job than the second w5500 (more expensive).

is it only the design that change between them or performance can also be different ?

thx

#4

wish to have a lot of stuff on that page

Some examples? You do not need to have the Arduino hosting pictures and style sheets and java scripts, etc.

#5

currently have some automated thing in my house (arduino) and I wish to be able to control them over my local network (tablet/phone/pc with the web browser)and from the internet when away. I will show every state of all my sensor/motors (got by a nrf24l01). I planned to have some picture, like a plan of the house, to show over it the state of my stuff. so yes wish to have images/ccs for styling. maybe not javascript.

thank you PaulS, you are responding to a lot of my post lately. I'm a good programmer but not that good with electronic and new in arduino world. that's why I'm posting a lot of question.

#6

so yes wish to have images/ccs for styling. maybe not javascript.

Why? Post that static stuff somewhere else, and just send the appropriate links. A real computer can send data orders of magnitude faster that any Arduino with Ethernet shield and SD card.

#7

just to be sure I understand right, you told me to store the picture and static stuff like that on another server and simply code the page (html) on the Ethernet shield with picture linked from somewhere else? if yes, the idea is good i didn't think about that.

but that doesn't help me to choose from all the Ethernet shield on the market.

I have no one right now, so I need to choose and buy one between a common w5100 chip for almost no $, or some w5500 chip a little bit more expensive. That was my first question. there is two different type in my first post and don't know if both are ok or if I should avoid one or another.

I don't want to buy a w5500 if it is harder to work with and have to buy another one after.

What would you do ? go with an w5100 or a faster w5500 (and which of the both linked higher would you buy if you choose a w5500) ?

thx

#8

just to be sure I understand right, you told me to store the picture and static stuff like that on another server and simply code the page (html) on the Ethernet shield with picture linked from somewhere else? if yes, the idea is good i didn’t think about that.

Yes, that is what I’m saying.

When a browser asks for a file, that file can contain links to other files. The browser will than ask for them separately. The browser can see that the files are to be fetched from other servers, instead of from the Arduino.

but that doesn’t help me to choose from all the Ethernet shield on the market.

Nor have you defined why the standard W5100 chip, which is well supported, is not adequate.

#9

I'm not sure to understand the "nor" term (i'm french sorry). I guess you are asking me why I don't want to use the w5100 ?

It is because when I first began to use arduino for my blinds's automation project, I red a lot before and when it was time to buy my arduino kit and all the piece needed, i got a lot of error and incompatibility between librairy and/or pin used by interupt or other thing like that. That seemed so easy before beginning, that I was disappointed when I began my project for real.

So now I red a lot of forum and ask a lot of question just to make sure to not buy something it won't work the way I tought and also loosing money and time.

So I never tested an ethernet shield yet. But I red a lot of thing telling the w5100 is slow if compared to the w5200 and newer model.

I tought it could be better if I buy a "faster" one, so my browser can have a faster response. I really don't know how faster the w5500 can be compare to the w5100.

By your answer I'm sure your are telling me to buy a w5100 because of the easy support for this chip.

Thank you for your advice.

#10

So I never tested an ethernet shield yet. But I red a lot of thing telling the w5100 is slow if compared to the w5200 and newer model.

I haven’t seen that stated in this forum. Where did you see that the w5100 is slow if compared to the w5200?

#11

Not on this forum but on many web site like those:

And (linked in the previous article)

#12

I looked at the articles and the w5200 chip seems to have some chip performance improvements, but that may or may not result in performance improvements depending on how the chip is used. The w5500 didn’t show any performance improvement over the w5200 chip, so the w5200 chip board might be your best bet.

#13

If you buy an Ethernet shield with the W5100 chip, one with the W5200 chip, and one with the W5500 chip, they will ALL communicate with the Arduino using the same 4 pins. Your argument about conflicts does not hold water.

#14

AFAIK, the difference with the normal Arduino boards (excluding the Due) is the number of sockets. The w5100 has 4, and the w5200 and w5500 have 8.

There is a SPI maximum speed difference. The w5100 has a maximum SPI clock speed of about 12 MHz, and the w5200/5500 has a max clock speed of 25MHz. However, the Uno and Mega have a max SPI clock speed of 8MHz, so the Arduino SPI clock speed is really the limiting factor.

#15

Just responding as I'm the guy who did the speed testing on the W5100, W5200, and W5500. I've had some conversations with Wiznet about these devices too, so some not so clear things have been made obvious to me.

There are a couple of pretty significant differences between these devices that make me wonder why the W5100 is still the default standard for Arduino. The W5500 is the best chip to use today, and I'll try to explain why.

W5200 and W5500 both have 8 sockets, and double the amount of Rx & Tx RAM of the W5100. This is really useful, as it can save you losing frames as the Arduino responds quite slowly.

The W5200 and W5500 both have streaming capability on the SPI interface. It is implemented a little differently between the two, but essentially it is much much (much) faster to drive than the W5100, IF you have a streaming SPI interface. The Arduino code for the SPI interface library is (very) basic, and doesn't have any kind of interrupt driven ring buffer or otherwise. This makes me wonder how much difference would really result using Arduino libraries. However the fact that frame data can be read and written continually, without re-transmitting the three address bytes for each data byte still results in an 4x speed up over the W5100.

The W5200 and W5500 both have a much faster SPI interface than the W5100. The W5100 has only a 4 MHz SPI interface, which means that it can only run at half the maximum available on an Arduino board. You might be lucky and have one that exceeds specification. But, don't count on it. The W5200 and W5500 are made to run at over 30 MHz SPI in real life, no issue for AVR ATmega.

So much about speed. Between the W5200 and the W5500 there are some further significant differences.

The packet RAM on the W5500 has been made available as general storage for the host MCU. Both Tx and Rx RAM is available for use as required. This means that it is possible to augment the RAM on an Arduino Uno by 16kBytes (8kB Tx and 8kB Rx) which is 8x more than the ATmega328p has in total, and still maintain the same sized buffers available in the W5100, for example.

The Tx and Rx RAM is arranged in blocks associated with the socket, and the entire 16 bit address space is rolled out onto the configured RAM for each socket. This means that when writing or reading the W5500 Tx and Rx RAM the user doesn’t need to be concerned with masking the maximum physical RAM, and addressing roll-over is gracefully handled. This is unlike the W5100 and W5200, where RAM addressing would have to be masked against the configured physical RAM. If this sounds complicated, just check the datasheet where it is explained in a nice diagram.

And the final issue that I want to cover is that the W5500 finally resolves the long standing ARP errata that required holding the Subnet mask to 0.0.0.0, and storing it off device. This errata is present in the W5200 and W5100.

#16