The RN-131-PICTAIL and RN-171-PICTAIL evaluation boards work seamlessly with the Microchip Technology PIC18 Explorer Development Board. The evaluation boards plug into the PICtail modular connector on the PIC18 Explorer Board, and add wireless functionality to PIC18-based microcontroller designs. The evaluation boards are preloaded with firmware to simplify integration and minimize application development. In the simplest configuration, the hardware only requires four connections (PWR, TX, RX, and GND) to create a wireless data connection. The microcontroller can communicate with the boards via the UART and SPI interfaces, and can drive LEDs, wake the boards, and reset them. The evaluation boards are updated and controlled with a simple ASCII command language. Once the boards are set up, they can scan to find an access point, associate, authenticate, and connect over any Wi-Fi network.
FCC/CE/IC certified 2.4GHz IEEE 802.11b/g transceiver Plugs into the PICtail Plus connector on the PIC18 Explorer and Explorer 16 Development Boards Adds wireless capability to designs targeting the PIC18 Explorer and Explorer 16 boards Configurable transmit power: 0 to 10dBm (RN-171-PICTAIL) PCB trace antenna (RN-171-PICTAIL) and on-board ceramic chip antenna (RN-131-PICTAIL) 4uA sleep, 38mA Rx, 120mA Tx at 0 dBm (RN-171-PICTAIL) 4uA sleep, 40mA Rx, 210mA Tx (RN-131-PICTAIL) 921Kbps Tx, 500Kbps Rx data rate with TCP/IP and WPA2 over UART, up to 2Mbps over SPI slave UART interface with hardware flow control SPI interface with slave interrupt Real-time clock for wakeup and time stamping 3 x status LEDs (2 configurable) Powered by PIC18 Explorer and Explorer 16 boards Supports ad hoc and infrastructure networks Wi-Fi Alliance certified for WPA2-PSK Complete on-board TCP/IP networking stack
