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Xbee socket board

Posted by Reto on April 10, 2009 at 1:00am
XBeeBreakout-01-L_i_ma.jpgWhile testing my setup, it often disturbed me that the Xbee Pro doesn't have a led somewhere to show it's powered up.Since I mount it onto a ply through an Xbee breakout board like the one on the picture, I just soldered a small red led between the VCC and GND. Now I know when it's powered ok without having to setup all Xbee transmission line.Of course, the led doesn't tell me if the Xbee is transmitting/receiving.
Tags: xbee, power
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  • Developer
    Jordi Muñoz April 12, 2009 at 9:57am
    Ian:

    This boards are simple and nice, but are more for prototyping (you know put it in and breadboard make connections and so on). I love the adafruit because it has its own power regulator so you can connect it o the Ardupilot power supply. Also (and is very important) it has 5v TLL converter to 3v TTL level signals, very important because the Xbee works only with 3V signals and ArduPilot don't. If you are using the 2.4ghz XBee version you must convert those signals, only the 900mhz versions support 5Volts TTL signals without damaging the board (over time).. But this only in the latest versions.
  • ian April 12, 2009 at 8:24am
    jordi: Can you say what you do not like about them? I have neither, but since my uC is already at 3.3V (not an arduino), I don't need the level converter on the Adafruit board, I guess the the leds might be helpful though. On the Sparkfun site it lists a number of complaints for their XBee board related to the assembly. Perhaps this is what you are referring to?
  • Reto April 11, 2009 at 11:26am
    Hi Jordi. Good you found better ones. Those were the first I ordered, so I use them! But if I get more Xbees then I'll certainly try some others.
  • Developer
    Jordi Muñoz April 11, 2009 at 10:48am
    I have several of those Sparkfun boards (like 10) and i don't like them... I prefer for the airplane the adafruit one and the Sparkfun USB version for the ground station (the red one with FTDI chip)...
  • Reto April 10, 2009 at 4:46am
    Neat Xbee breakout too. But since I already have a regulated +3.3v power source, I could add the second RSSI led and would have about the same for half the price. Anyhow I have no need plugging it to an FTDI. Thanks for the link.
  • Michael April 10, 2009 at 4:00am
    Try this site.

    http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=...
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