Q68 wifi dongle updates...
Posted: Thu Feb 08, 2018 9:52 pm
Given the positive response and some suggestions from my small group of testers, I am making some changes to the V2 Q68 dongle. I will release the V1 dongle as a limited run, just to satisfy immediate demand. It seems the response to my dongle was so positive that it could be a nice, generally useful product all over the place in the retro community.
One of the main problems my test group reported was that it was hard to configure the serial to work. Getting the speed, start/stop bits and etc to match was a bit of a pain, considering the dongle would just do nothing and tell you nothing until it was connected.
So, I have decided to add a small OLED 128x32 character display to it. I am going to add the following functionality:
A button. If pressed once it will show the configured serial port speed. If pressed again, it will cycle through the speeds, 300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600, 19200, 38400, 76800, 115200, 230400, 460800....
Once a wifi link is established it will show AP name, IP, signal strength, serial speed, and maybe an up/down data counter. It's going to be pretty cool, and I might be able to sell a LOT of these into the retro community. Like, in the US market, *THOUSANDS*...
I'll also add to the PCB pads for the PHY and magnetics for hard wired 10/100 ethernet so it could be a built-time option for an extra tenner or so.
Anyone want to help me write the firmware? It's just C++ in the arduino dev environment. Anyone who contributes code would get a far share of the proceeds. I think a device like this would sell for $50+ to the US retro community in a consumer friendly package.
One of the main problems my test group reported was that it was hard to configure the serial to work. Getting the speed, start/stop bits and etc to match was a bit of a pain, considering the dongle would just do nothing and tell you nothing until it was connected.
So, I have decided to add a small OLED 128x32 character display to it. I am going to add the following functionality:
A button. If pressed once it will show the configured serial port speed. If pressed again, it will cycle through the speeds, 300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600, 19200, 38400, 76800, 115200, 230400, 460800....
Once a wifi link is established it will show AP name, IP, signal strength, serial speed, and maybe an up/down data counter. It's going to be pretty cool, and I might be able to sell a LOT of these into the retro community. Like, in the US market, *THOUSANDS*...
I'll also add to the PCB pads for the PHY and magnetics for hard wired 10/100 ethernet so it could be a built-time option for an extra tenner or so.
Anyone want to help me write the firmware? It's just C++ in the arduino dev environment. Anyone who contributes code would get a far share of the proceeds. I think a device like this would sell for $50+ to the US retro community in a consumer friendly package.
