How to start with nFR9160

[RogerYQ]

I am new with nRF9160, just bought a nRF9160 DK from overseas, but I use it in China, two questions come up.

1. Is it working with China celluar network?

I tried the Basis eSIM (comes with the DK box) with AT Client Sample but fail to register network, checked the AT+CESQ, result is always 99. I am sure I have connected the Antenna to J1. is anything I am wrong?

2. How to quick program my own applicaton?

Before I come with nRF9160, I studied STM32 MCU with other celluar modem, ST provides an user friendly IDE to help to generate many code for me, is there a similar tool for nRF9160?

I did a check with nRF connected wiht SES, seems no?

then how do I quick start programming? and from which document I can know what library or function provided by Nordic so I can call them?

Thanks!

Roger

[Heidi]

Hi!

1. Yes, the nRF9160 SiP works with some Chinese cellular networks. We have completed the SRRC Certification for both LTE-M and NB-IoT on B3, B5, B8. See nRF9160 Certifications for more information. We are also certified with China Telecom on NB-IoT.

However, according to the iBasis coverage map, iBasis does not have a roaming agreement in China yet, so the SIM that comes with the development kit will not work where you are unfortunately. 

You will have to purchase a nano-SIM from China Telecom that supports the NB-IoT protocol. Make sure to use the same hardware, NCS and modem firmware version as was used for the certification. You can find that information on the Mobile network operator certifications page.

2. To program your own application, we offer an integration between NCS and SES. This is a program called SEGGER Embedded Studio Nordic Edition.  If you are on Windows, you can use the Toolchain manager in nRF Connect for Desktop to open SES with the correct parameters configured.

If not, you can also download it manually, see "Installing SEGGER Embedded Studio Nordic Edition".

A lot of users also just use Visual Studio Code to edit the files and build and flash via command line using west, see "Building in the command line". 

As for the documentation, the source code located in ncs/nrf is documented here. If you look in the lower left-hand corner, you can also select the documentation for Zephyr, nrfxlib, MCUboot and all Kconfigs. 

We also have a lot of samples available for the nRF9160 DK, so perhaps we have something available that you could use as a reference for your own application so you don't have to start from scratch. 

Please let me know if you have any more questions!

Best regards,

Heidi

[RogerYQ]

Hi Heidi,

Thank you so much for your reply! I will have some study following your instruction, thank you!

Regards,

Roger