Embedded Wifi?

How much work would you like to do ?

Google found many sites with this already done and many very cheap.

hamilton

Let's see if we can break things down into a less silly sequence of questions.

Connecting an ISA Ethernet Nic to an 8051 was a simple matter of connecting controller i/o pins to ISA address and data signals, and then excercising the lines to mimic processor bus activity.

Having little knowledge of PCI interfacing, my next silly question involves the difficulty associated in port mapping PCI Wifi card control registers as had been done with the Ethernet ISA Nic?

Dumb idea? PCI doesn't lend itself to that? Possible?

All positive suggestions and directions greatly appreciated.

Modafinil.

Hi,

Hi Hamilton,

Thanks for the reply.

Hmmm...a cheapo solution that anyone can get going for a few bucks would be ideal. I'm hoping for a very basic TCP/IP hook-up over Wifi, using a common, junky old throw-away 802.11/b card. The Ethernet ISA NIC version was a tear-away success.

Modafinil.

Hmmm, I would guess you did not google for any information.

Yes, it can be done.

Is $100 cheap enough ? Is $50 cheap enough ?

Can a old 802.11b card be used, yes. How much is your time worth ?

Is this a learning project, or do just want it to work ?

Can it be done with an 8051(class), I doubt it.

This may be able to help you understand what you are asking.

hamilton

I have yet to locate a documented wifi interface part or module on the market so that one could interface it at low level (i.e. its driver will look like an Ethernet driver to the higher level). I have not been googling for that for some months now so your findings might be a nice surprise to me - can point me to something which is on the market and is documented?

Dimiter

------------------------------------------------------ Dimiter Popoff Transgalactic Instruments

------------------------------------------------------

Original message:

The OPs question was can a 8051 be connected to a WiFi, Yes:

Can an 8051 be connected to a 802.11b PCCard, I doubt it, I have looked for years with no results.

hamilton

2. >

Just today I ordered this little unit:

Which is an Atmel Amega 328 and WiFi module all packed on to a small DIP. Asynch Labs also have Arduino Wifi shields

Jeremy Bentham's "TCP/IP Lean" shows how to interface a PIC16F877 to a

802.11b PC Card.

Andrew

PCCard is basically ISA with a different connector. Since the many sources document connecting an 8051 to an ISA card, I would think it's possible. Cardbus (32-bit PCI with a different connector), OTOH, is a different kettle of fish.

--
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow! FOOLED you!  Absorb
                                  at               EGO SHATTERING impulse
                               visi.com            rays, polyester poltroon!!

Yes, this is correct.

So unless the OP has an older PCCard.....

The Cardbus cards has a gold plated strip on the connector. As seen in the pic about half way down the linked page.

The PCCard did not.

hamilton

As recently discussed on another thread in this group you might, if your budget permits, interface to Wifi through a Lantronix WiPort module. If you google for "Wifi Module" you will see that there are a number of alternatives, not only interfacing through a serial port but also through an SPI interface.

Andrew

Hi Andrew,

Now that I would have never found by Googling. Personal experience rocks! You wouldn't happen to know off-hand, Andrew, which edition of Bentham the Wifi article of interest may have appeared in, would you? I can't seem to find it in my very tatty old 2nd edition.

Yes, I'm stepping into the 'making a fool of myself' domain by naively proposing the re-use of an otherwise junk wifi card. The $1 throw-away Ethernet card solution to embedded TCP/IP went over really well with 8051 crowd, so I figure it's worth looking the twit if I can provide an equal number of enthusiasts, with as highly affordable a weekend's entertainment.

Modafinil.

Ah I think that I may slightly have mislead you. I have the same edition of the book as you but, at about the same time, I also bought one of the chipweb wireless kits from Jeremy's company (). Looking at the website it is all still available. When I have contacted Jeremy in the past he was very helpful.

There are, almost certainly, a lot of those cards around. Using them for 8051 networking is definitely better than them contributing to landfill!

Andrew

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for your informative reply.

Yes, I stumbled upon the

site shortly after inquiring to you about my TCP/IP Lean edition confusion. I found the ER21 embedded

802.11b development kit for the PicMicro, and which incorporates a PCMCIA Wifi module. Jeremy certainly seems to be the man to consult in this area, yet I was hoping for a less valuable solution to his apparently very professional software and hardware offerings.

Well it doesn't look like there is much, if anything, available within the realm of uController to PCI card interconnection. Conceivably this may mean that my line of inquiry was indeed stupid, and that there is considerably more to the problem than the ISA interface presented. Looks like I'll have to do a bit of PCI bus research, as I'm not prepared to chuck it in just yet.

Thanks again everyone for your links, comments and contributions. They are all very much appreciated.

Modafinil.

Ubicom do some MCUs designed to interface to PCI peripherals - the Logitech Squeezebox audio player uses one to interface to a PCI WLAN module :

You might also want to look at MCUs that have USB otg/host to talk to a USB wifi module, however these modules are likely to be poorly documented, if at all. I suspect they may also rely on the host PC to do some of their work.

Just today I ordered this little unit:

Which is an Atmel Amega 328 and WiFi module all packed on to a small DIP. Asynch Labs also have Arduino Wifi shields

Hi Hansp,

My stupid browser wouldn't let me fully view the link you posted, yet I was excited to learn that combined uController and Wifi SoC devices are already beginning to appear. Many of the semiconductor manufacturer websites now feature futurist's predictions of the impending ubiquity of less powerfully resourced network appliances.

Personally, I'm hanging-out for ASIX Corporation's slightly overdue release of their combined uController with integrated Wifi SOC, from their new AX220xx device family.

This blisteringly quick 8051/ 80C390 controller pairing pulls 80-MIPS running standard 8051 instructions, has a full Megabyte of ISP flash program memory, and sports both 10/100Mbit Fast Ethernet MAC and 802.11a/b/g MAC/ Baseband Wifi circuitry onboard. I had some involvement in the 8051 adaptation of the TCP/IP protocol stack code that will ship with the new ASIX Wifi device. Perhaps understandably, I'm bursting to see how well it performs with ASIX' advanced integrated TCP/IP offload processing hardware.

Getting back to the surplus PCI Wifi card to uController interfacing concept, I've recently discovered that some Wifi chips also sport high-speed serial ports. Could these represent an alternate control option to the regular PCI bus? Try as I might, I've been fully unsuccessful in locating any relevant Atheros chipset datasheets. I had hoped these to confirm the high-speed port's true function, so I'm certainly open to datasheet source suggestions.if anyone thinks they can help.

Modafanil.