nRF-Sniffer antenna tuning

[Joe Merten]

I'm using nRF-Shiffer V 0.97 on a PCA10000 V2.2.0 Usb dongle. I see lots of helpful details.

But the problem is, that the sniffer often misses parts of the communication.

I have some automated Ble tests, were a Android central connects the nRF51822 peripheral 10 times, were for each connection session the tests are performing some different e.g. gatt communication

Within the Android Ble Hci Snoop Log and also in my nRF51822 peripheral debug output, I see the whole communication. But the nRF-Sniffer log catched just a part of the traffic.

Maybe its, because the poor pcb antenna of the PCA10000?

The questions now:

• Does the nRF-Sniffer software works with nRFgo, as I could plug a PCA10005 on it with a better antenna?
• May it possible to replace the PCA10000's antenna with a better one?
• Any other suggestions to improve the sniffing capabilities of nRF-Sniffer?

Ble-Sniffer.jpg

Edit: Seeing the V 1.0.1 update today and the userguide now lists 2 additional hardware pieces: PCA10003 and PCA10028. But when I take a look to www.nordicsemi.com, I cannot find a spec for PCA10003 neither for PCA10028.

Which of the 4 supported hardware pieces might have the best sniffing capabilities?

[David Edwin]

The issue that you see is very unlikely to be due to antenna issues, can you switch to the latest version of the nRF Sniffer and let me know if the problem persists. If your problem persists, please post a trace of the sniffer logs so I can take a look at it.

[Joe Merten]

Ok. It will take a bit time, because I'd currently switched to a different project.

[Asbjørn]

I couldn't find the references to PCA10003 and PCA10028 in the sniffer user guide, but in general you will be better of to use the PCA10001 board with regard to antenna performance. I would also ask you to consider the placement of the board and make sure that you place the sniffer between the central and peripheral. Are you placing the central and peripheral far from each other? Do you have multiple centrals and peripherals close to your sniffer?