Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and internet access. Wi-Fi most employs the radio-waves of frequency 2.4 GHz (120 mm) for Ultra High Frequency band and 5 - 6 GHz for Super High Frequency bands.
Advantages of Wi-Fi
• Network Type - Wi-Fi has the ability to support star connections (stations with central access point), Peer-to-peer connections (Wi-Fi direct) and mesh networks. Wi-Fi is commonplace in most home and enterprise environments, allowing products with this technology to very quickly connect to existing infrastructures.
• Wireless Robustness - Wi-Fi supports operation in the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, enabling flexibility of Wi-Fi products to decide which band they’d like to support. Wi-Fi’s ability to operate in the 5 GHz band enables products to benefit from less congested
channels to improve performance. Additionally, advanced PHY modulation schemes enable Wi-Fi to send data quickly, reducing the time on the air and chance of collisions.
• Security - Wi-Fi has an active ecosystem that constantly evolves its security to keep it up to date and robust against hackers. Wi-Fi data can be encrypted before being transmitted by using the latest WPA3 personal and enterprise level encryption. Wi-Fi also has multiple layers of security because of its native IP like TLS. Our products meet some of the highest level of security with FIPS 140-2 validation.
• Throughput - The Wi-Fi protocol is designed to be scalable to support a variety of application throughput requirements ranging from edge nodes to gateways. It enables fast over-the-air (OTA) updates and typical IoT/edge node devices with throughputs up
to 100Mbps utilizing MIMO(Multiple Input Multiple Output).
• Power Consumption - The Wi-Fi protocol is flexible and allows very low average power consumption while connected to the network for battery-operated applications. It is also the most power efficient per bits of data transfer.
• Target Applications - Wi-Fi is commonly used in consumer, industrial and enterprise applications to enable wireless connections between devices and the cloud. Wi-Fi can be found in products for smart buildings such as video surveillance, HVAC, access
controls; for healthcare such as patient monitors, medical equipment; for grid infrastructure such as smart meters, solar/renewable energy, EV charging; and many more smart products that need connection to the internet and remote monitoring. Note that Wi-Fi is one of the most widely used wireless communication standard between devices to the Internet.
Potential disadvantages of Wi-Fi
• Power consumption - The Wi-Fi network include overhead of additional transmissions/receive cycles in addition to application requirements to maintain Wi-Fi connections. Calibration and TX/RX currents can be higher than other technologies making Wi-Fi solutions rely on AA batteries and have higher peak current draw.
• Range - 5 GHz transmissions have reduced range due to the increased path loss of transmitting at higher frequencies. This also reduces its ability to penetrate solid surfaces like walls or ceilings in a home.
An overview of the CC3220x hardware from Texas Instruments:
The CC3220MODx and CC3220MODAx module family is a complete platform solution including software, sample applications, tools, user and programming guides, reference designs, and the E2E™ online community.
Wireless (Wi-Fi) MCUs supported by DigiKey:
Part Numbers
| DK Part # | Mfr Part # | |
|---|---|---|
| 296-46989-2-ND,296-46989-1-ND,296-46989-6-ND | CC3220MODSF12MOBR | |
| 296-38902-2-ND,296-38902-1-ND,296-38902-6-ND | CC3200R1M2RGCR | |
| 296-53414-2-ND,296-53414-1-ND,296-53414-6-ND | CC3235SF12RGKR | |
| 296-47158-2-ND,296-47158-1-ND,296-47158-6-ND | CC3220MODASF12MONR | |
| 296-45441-2-ND,296-45441-1-ND,296-45441-6-ND | CC3220SM2ARGKR | |
| 296-45442-2-ND,296-45442-1-ND,296-45442-6-ND | CC3220RM2ARGKT | |
| 296-53415-2-ND,296-53415-1-ND,296-53415-6-ND | CC3235SM2RGKR | |
| 296-CC3230SF12RGKRTR-ND,296-CC3230SF12RGKRCT-ND,296-CC3230SF12RGKRDKR-ND | CC3230SF12RGKR | |
| 296-45440-2-ND,296-45440-1-ND,296-45440-6-ND | CC3220SM2ARGKT | |
| 296-46990-2-ND,296-46990-1-ND,296-46990-6-ND | CC3220MODSM2MOBR | |
| 296-38012-ND | CC3200R1M2RGC | |
| 296-47159-2-ND,296-47159-1-ND,296-47159-6-ND | CC3220MODASM2MONR | |
| 296-42325-2-ND,296-42325-1-ND,296-42325-6-ND | CC3200MODR1M2AMOBR | |
| 296-43564-2-ND,296-43564-1-ND,296-43564-6-ND | CC3200MODR1M2AMOBT | |
| 296-45443-2-ND,296-45443-1-ND,296-45443-6-ND | CC3220RM2ARGKR | |
| 296-CC3230SM2RGKRTR-ND,296-CC3230SM2RGKRCT-ND,296-CC3230SM2RGKRDKR-ND | CC3230SM2RGKR | |
| 296-45438-2-ND,296-45438-1-ND,296-45438-6-ND | CC3220SF12ARGKT | |
| 296-38419-2-ND,296-38419-1-ND,296-38419-6-ND | CC3200R1M1RGCR | |
| 296-45439-2-ND,296-45439-1-ND,296-45439-6-ND | CC3220SF12ARGKR | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301NP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3301NP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301AP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3301AP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301UP2TR-ND | BDE-BW3301UP2 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301UP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3301UP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301NP2TR-ND | BDE-BW3301NP2 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301NP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3301NP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301UP2-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3301UP2-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301AP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3301AP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301NP2-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3301NP2-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3301UP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3301UP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351AP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3351AP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351UP2TR-ND | BDE-BW3351UP2 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351UP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3351UP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351NP1TR-ND | BDE-BW3351NP1 | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351AP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3351AP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351NP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3351NP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351UP1-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3351UP1-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351UP2-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3351UP2-IN | |
| 3707-BDE-BW3351NP2-INTR-ND | BDE-BW3351NP2-IN |