I've been browsing the forum for a bit now, tried some things but still no success... so here's my problem...
My goal is to setup a simple bi-directional wireless link between two devices… using a PIC24F and the nRF24L01+ chip as the hardware. I should say that the RF side is actually a module which has an extra PA + LNA attached (+ SMA/duck antenna). There is no fancy networking. I just want one PTX and one PRX using the “ACK + Payload” system with a fixed packet length of 4 bytes. I thought this would be easy, but to this point I haven't got any reliable communications between my two radios, I think that I have seen one packet about every 60s (if lucky). It could be hardware or software related… and I’m not using any library (probably a mistake there). I tried using the steps in the datasheet (different addresses – I’m using AA:AA:AA:AA:AA ) without success. I'm a little confused about the configuration and how to setup the “ACK + Payload”
My initialisation values below are printed out from UART (in hex) below…
INIT PRX, CMD: 20 DATA: 7F, CMD: 22 DATA: 1, CMD: 21 DATA: 1, CMD: 31 DATA: 4, CMD: 2A DATA: AA AA AA AA AA, CMD: 23 DATA: 3, CMD: 24 DATA: 34, CMD: 25 DATA: 78, CMD: 26 DATA: 26, CMD: 3C DATA: 1, CMD: 3D DATA: 6, CMD: 27 DATA: 70, FLUSH_TX, FLUSH_RX, INIT PRX COMPLETE,
INIT PTX, CMD: 20 DATA: 7E, CMD: 22 DATA: 1, CMD: 21 DATA: 1, CMD: 31 DATA: 4, CMD: 2A DATA: AA AA AA AA AA, CMD: 30 DATA: AA AA AA AA AA, CMD: 23 DATA: 3, CMD: 24 DATA: 34, CMD: 25 DATA: 78, CMD: 26 DATA: 26, CMD: 3C DATA: 1, CMD: 3D DATA: 6, CMD: 27 DATA: 70, FLUSH_TX, FLUSH_RX, INIT PTX COMPLETE,
Firstly, can someone please identify if there is anything wrong with these (above) values?
When I go through a process of elimination, I can see that there are certain registers (that can be written) which are common i.e. SETUP_AW, SETUP_RETR, RF_CH, RF_SETUP… also the RX_ADDR_P0, EN_AA and EN_RXADDR are the same too. Because I have been trying so many ways I’m second guessing myself so… could someone please suggest (explicitly) a working configuration for PTX and PRX… specifically the registers: EN_AA, EN_RXADDR, RX_ADDR_P0, TX_ADDR, RX_PW_P0, DYNPD and FEATURE.
Regarding the hardware… outside the RF module, it is running from 3.3V, there is 20uF ceramic and 0.1uF ceramic on the supply rail… I have setup the module for the highest RF output and am typically seeing about 50mA (for both, which seems low?) when I’m sending about 1 packet per second. They are powered from (the same) 12V battery. The two units are side by side on my desk about 30cm apart.
Any suggestions here too would also be muchly appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!
P.S. your forum re-formatted my text to remove the carriage return... I added some commas for the UART dump??
