Morning All, I am considering purchasing the RAK831 gateway board for the Raspberry pi. Is that still a favourable model or has it been superseeded ?
I intend to install the gateway for my own personal use, mainly because I live at the end of a valley with my only window being into mid Wales and cannot access any other gateway. I have considered constructing a single channel gateway but I know it would be frowned upon, would it be so bad in my situation as I would be the only user ? Any suggestions greatly appreciated. Thanks…
I am sure you will understand that the TTN forum does not wish to act as a technical resource of information or source of advice on non compliant TTN\LoRaWAN devices.
So the advice regarding the RAK831 pi board would be ??
Frowned upon isn’t really the right emotion - it’s more at the catagorically ban end of feelings - we do not support Single Channel Packet Forwarder (they are not gateways, gateways listen on 8 channels) because they are disruptive to the community and we ask people that are using them to stop immediately.
How can you tell you would be the only user? How can you be sure you would be the only user? What if someone else deploys some devices in a weeks time?
You’d also have to build your own devices and in some way subvert the code so that they could communicate with your SCPF.
An older model that RAK no longer sells itself, check out the other options here:
Thanks for the info guys, so moving forward in a positive direction and considering my location it would seem a good idea to invest in an Gateway board in the form of a pi hat, in which any device can access if suitably located. I have a budget of around £150 for the concentrator board, are there any recommendations within that budget. Maybe the RAK 2245 ?
That would be fine if you want to build your own system, alternatively they also offer a number of pre built systems - the 724x series of which the 7246 (blue box!) is the cheapest
You might also consider the TTIG or say Dragino LPS8 as low cost options if not too focussed on GW dev or needing detaled GW logs (TTIG).
IIRC the 224x boards have a reduced speed SPI i/f due to use of a level translator that you will need to adjust your Pi to (search if your friend)
(Mod note: Thread title edited to correct/aid search)
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The Pi firmware RAK supply will get you going - you can then roll your own if there is anything special you are trying to achieve.
As @Jeff-UK is my go to resource for gateway chip sets, perhaps some erudition on SX1301 (RAK2245) vs SX1302 (RAK2287) from him would be good?
Well having read the literature regarding the RAK2245 and deciding that’s what I will try to purchase it appears they are not easy to come across!
Do any of you guys know of any UK suppliers of the unit or a trustworthy supplier outside of the UK ?
Google will probably help best with finding UK stock
This online shop usually has decent stock levels:
https://store.rakwireless.com/collections/wislink-lpwan/products/rak2245-pi-hat
Thanks Nick, all sorted now as item is back in stock and my order has been placed. Best regards.
Didn’t think it worth starting a new thread, so here goes…
The rak 2245 has arrived and is now operational.
I went for the RPi hat edition, the only downside to the firmware I installed is there is no gui, its just a command line interface. I would prefer a firmware that runs a gui as I am used to Rasbian and also I would like to run another piece of software on the same Pi. Has anyone any input they can share ? Thanks.
Which model of Pi are you using?
What ‘other’ piece of software do you want to run?
Mostly gateways are set & forget, a few minutes of pain using a command line editor to set settings and then you leave it be.
Loading a GUI, even a very basic X GUI, is literally the lump hammer to crack a nut. At worst, you could have it installed and startx at the command line to bring it up. But it all depends on what you have in mind to run.
As it happens, I have a gateway with a hand installed X Windows so it can run Chrome so it can display a dashboard as well as being a gateway - but that’s mostly left alone once it’s on, not an interactive sort of thing.
Hi, thanks for the reply.
Its a Pi 3B ( it could be the +) .
I see where your coming from regarding just having a command line, also I was thinking of having Auto Sonde RX on it for tracking the sondes.
BR.
Tough call, the SDR will be a fair old load and whilst you may have only a handful of devices, you may be in an area that currently has or grows to have a fair number of other TTN’rs with devices. LoRaWAN has some timing critical elements which is why we tend to go for low power, simple device not doing anything else.
Are you listening for the sondes all the time or as & when the wind is in the right direction. ie, can you use another machine for that? Do you ever manage to snag any?
The Rak gateway came with a small indoor antenna, however it is my intention to build a good outdoor colinear , From my location my rf window looks into Wales, but mostly I have nearby hills from the N.E round to the S.W.
I am situated in the South Shropshire hills, very beautiful ! But not Ideal for sonde reception , not like last year when I was living in Stoke on Trent where I could receive any sonde that was launched in the UK and some over in France and Belgium.
I did collect a sonde which landed a few miles down the road , just the one. I leave auto sonde rx on all the time but I can install that on another Pi. I will get round to reprogramming the sonde one day and maybe even send it skywards again.
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Can 8 or more LoRa devices and an RPI4 be used to make a 915MHz gateway? Is there a topic on this?
Yes, but the code would be a nightmare and as CAD isn’t very good on all SF’s it wouldn’t be as good as a concentrator card.
And then there is the wiring. And the multiple time sensitive SPI devices. And the 8 antennas. The case. Etc etc.
And getting hold of an RPi4 is like hunting Unicorns.
And if you value your time at $1/hour, you will save money buying a $100 concentrator card within the first two weeks of starting the project.
No, it’s a good question but a very very foolish endeavour, so I think you may be the first to suggest this!
No. LoRa devices can’t reliably listen at multiple spreading factors as required for a gateway. Also a LoRaWAN gateway can receive two transmissions on the same frequency with different spreading factors simultaneously. That won’t be possible with individual Lora devices.
Yes, it has been discussed several times on the forum over the years. Especially years ago when gateways were well over 500 dollars/euros. And the answer is always that it won’t work. Both technically and financially. A cheap gateway is less then the components required for your solution these days.
Thanks!
Thanks. 1) I have 8 RPIs laying around and a lot of devices and no gateway. 2) I don’t value my time. It’s all fun. 3) Ive been afraid to buy a gateway concebtrator because I dont know if I will get something that works with a new setup or if its old old old. Its a chicken and egg thing.