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Permalink Reply by Jake Stew on July 24, 2012 at 11:56am

The Synapse modules use SiLabs chips, same as the 3DR radios.  They have a lot better performance than Xbees.

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Permalink Reply by Valent Turkovic on July 24, 2012 at 12:27pm

Great, nice to hear that I was on the right track. Have you been using Snap in urban setting where you had to go through buildings or many walls to send and receive signals?

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Permalink Reply by Jake Stew on July 24, 2012 at 12:40pm

I actually use the 3DR radios.  They are based on HopeRF modules, which use the Si1000 radio/mcu chip from SiLabs.  The firmware developed for them is excellent, but made for point-to-point rather than mesh networking or multi-node communication.

The Synapse modules are essentially the same except they have the SNAP firmware loaded on them, which gives them the extra networking features.  AFAIK you could load that firmware onto the 3DR radios provided you purchased the license.

Another radio you might want to check out is the RFD900, which is another radio based on the same chip.  It uses the 3DR radio firmware, but has an integrated amplifier to give 1W power output and exposes a number of pins from the processor so that you could add interesting features.

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Permalink Reply by Delfin Magote III on July 31, 2012 at 10:25pm

jake, have you tried using joystick control on your 3dr radios? how's the performance? im planning to use joystick controls on RFD900 and if 3DR performs well then I'll have full telemetry control and the rc transmitter will just be a backup.

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