N-fuse mPCIe Concentrator Card ( SX1301 / SX1308 )

Gateways
21

Thanks!

22

There is a new feature that we have now successfully validated and tested with the n-fuse LRWCCx-MPCIE-XXX LoRaWAN concentrator card that I would like to mention here:

There is a firmware for the on board MCU available that allows to talk to the card using a UART instead of USB. It’s not mini PCIe compatible but might still be useful for custom designs.

The nice thing about this:

  • Only the MCU needs to be re-flashed, you can use the same hardware. The firmware is available from here.
  • No USB required but still improved stability as the MCU is taking care of time sensitive tasks
  • The forwarder and HAL driver to not require any change.

We have updated the data sheet of our device accordingly.

23

I got this card yesterday and already have my gateway running. Really fast delivery and the parts look great.

BUT, I have to mention the provided pigtail from n-fuse doesn’t physically fit into the case, it is just too sturdy and will disconnect the plug if you bend it too much, the provided pigtails of the case unfortunately have the wrong gender on the sma side for the antenna.

Obviously it fits all together theoretically, but nobody was bothered enough to fit it physically together :wink:

It is in fact complaining on high level, since the price is really good, and given it worked right “out of the box” I would recommend this gateway.

24

@lindworm thank you for the positive review here.
The pigtail that we send with the kit fits and the gender must also be correct as you can see in the in the pictures in my post above. In case you should have received different parts, just contact the customer service and send over some pictures.

25

There is now a complete Gateway available based on the n-fuse LoRaWAN Cencentrator Mini PCIe card called lrwgwX-rpi-XXX based on the Raspberry PI 3B+ with Power over Ethernet Support:

LRWGWx-RPI_1024

1 Like
26

Hi fewi, it seemed a bit outdated but do you know what is the heat dissipation of this card? I mean will I be needing of heat-sink if I use this card in warm environment ?
Regards

27

I don’t have a heatsink but the chip gets very warm. Maybe @Vanthome could tell us more about it.

28

Hi, it’s not needed when your environment temperature is not greater than what’s given in the data sheet for the respective model: https://www.n-fuse.co/products/lrwccx/lrwccx-mpcie-datasheet.pdf

29

Thanks fewi

30

@Vanthome thank you for the answer, I hope not to test this device in such an environment :slight_smile: from -40 till +70 C … BTW, would you tell us what is major producer of heating inside the card, sx1301/1308 or other parts?

31

@ivanspirit absolutely, it’s with a huge margin the SX1301/ SX1308 which dissipate the heat.

32

Hi @Vanthome is this mPCI compliant ? I mean, can I plug it into any device that supports mPCI and start working? I see that it is also using the PicoGW from 2017, is it something outdated that will go away some time soon?

Thanks.

33

Hi, yes it is mPCIe compliant and you can plug it into any host that supports USB on the mPCIe slot which is not always the case and you might want to check.
Of course it’s still current and it will be available for probably 5 more years.
There is a successor planned but it has the same functioning principle as this design.
BG

34

Connectivity issue when using mPCIe slot

Problem :

We could get the chip id only for the first time. The second time it hangs and doesn’t give a output. After this reboot is the only way to recover from this state.

root@kg-b1-us-000004:~# cd lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id/
root@kg-b1-us-000004:~/lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id# ./util_chip_id
333833300c004800
root@kg-b1-us-000004:~/lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id# ./util_chip_id
^C
root@kg-b1-us-000004:~/lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id# ^C
root@kg-b1-us-000004:~/lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id# ./util_chip_id
^C
root@kg-b1-us-000004:~/lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id#

Steps to Reproduce:

  1. cd lora-net/picoGW_hal/util_chip_id/
  2. ./util_chip_id
  3. Repeat ./util_chip_id

The step 3 hangs.

This issue is seen only when connected over mPCIe slot.

when connected via USB using mPCIe to USB Adapter (link). It appears to hang occassionaly but recovers back.

Hardware:

  1. UP2 board running ubuntu 18.04 server
  2. N-Fuse LRWCC1-MPCIE-915 connected on MPCIE . (updated with lrwccx-mpcie-usb-fw-v0.2.1.dfu)

Software:

  1. GitHub - Lora-net/picoGW_hal: Host driver/HAL to build a LoRa Picocell Gateway which communicates through USB with a concentrator board based on Semtech SX1308 multi-channel modem and SX1257/SX1255 RF transceivers.
  2. GitHub - Lora-net/picoGW_packet_forwarder: A LoRa packet forwarder running on the host of a LoRa Picocell Gateway that forwards RF packets receive by the concentrator to a server through a IP/UDP link, and emits RF packets that are sent by the server.
35

Have you contacted the vendor? This forum might not be the official support channel for their products.

36

Yes I had already sent a mail to the support team.
I saw this forum was active so thought someone might have an idea…

37

This behavior happens on Intel platforms with SIM Card. You can solve this by masking PIN 16 (boot0) and PIN 22 (nrst) for example with an adhesive tape strip.