I suppose that, instead of creating an Ethernet-Zigbee gateway device and a bunch of Zigbee devices, one could also just make WiFi devices, if the chipsets and firmware support infrastructures are developed out enough yet so the costs compare favorably. But a quick survey suggests that WiFi still isn’t there yet. Lantronix makes the WiPort, an embeddable module which is sort of easy to use, and Mouser distributes it for $120/1, $100/10. DataHunter makes a G device called the Radion, which is $80/1 Nanoradio, and similar vendors make chipsets and modules which come way down in volume, but these are hard to get, hard to find dat for, and I believe don’t provide the TCP/IP stack etc. So, from my perspective, that of a glorified hobbyist, WiFi is still far too complex and expensive.

Not really an aiosphere project because of the bandwidth, but worth mentioning.  eStarling makes some cheap wifi picture frames that you can even email pics to.  Such a system is a great foundation for intriguing time-based systems.  A remote cam somewhere, set up to periodically send an image to the frame, makes a wonderful real-time window onto another place in the world.  Imagine a gallery of frames, all windows onto other places in the world?

I imagine outdoor shots, so it could get complex and expensive.  But to test such a system, why not use Panasonic’s low-cost net cam, which can email pics?

I am always searching for smaller, cheaper microcontrollers! Especially with UART.

NEC makes some compelling devices because of package size (2×2mm), but their feature set is very limited. No UART, no comparator.

Microchip doesn’t put the debug engine on their smaller, lower-cost micros. If you don’t mind debugging on a different micro, their F687, in 4×4mm QFN, is an attractive target for some designs, about a buck fifty in small qtys. Of course, they also make some very tiny, very low cost devices (10Fxx), but they are just too awful to program.

Zilog makes some 5×6QFN parts with UART, and they have a free dev environment. Hardware multiply! Lots of memory. About a buck and a half in small qtys.

NXP also make some small footprint and low cost (about a buck) micros, but only 1k mem max. Still, if you can make that work, the price is a powerful argument. High speed architecture, nice UART features, 3×3QFN.

Silicon Labs makes some useful micros for designs requiring lots of power and small footprints. Hardware multiplier, big memory options, fast clock, 3×3QFN, starting at about a buck seventy-five in small qtys. Can migrate to an OTP part for higher volumes, which cuts the price about in half.

Atmel makes one small, low-cost micro with UART, but it is too memory-constrained for many of my designs. Still, cheap.

As the creator of the MSP430 user group, I feel compelled to mention TI’s offerings. 6×6QFN, just over two bucks in small qtys. Buckets of memory, extremely low power, hardware multiplier.

And honorable mention goes to Freescale’s RS08 family, very few peripherals, not C programmable, but less than fifty cents even in small qtys.

Let’s make tiny smart objects!

My friend Gary Goddard turned me onto Tom Igoe’s book Making Things Talk this weekend. I’ve only looked at the first chapter O’Reilly has online, but it looks like a very useful resource for the aiosphere. Gary says it basically eliminates the need for the aiosphere project, but the first chapter sugests that it is completely at the other end of the spectrum: how to use expensive and complicated hardware, with rudimentary knowledge and very high level languages, to do point-to-point communications experiments. The aiosphere, on the other hand, will create a global hardware and software architecture for networked ambient devices. Anyway, this promises to be a good read.