LoRaWAN-megaBrick

Name: LoRaWAN-megaBrick
SKU: 19276
Price: 17.00 USD
Availability: InStock
Rating: 4.75 (4 reviews)

(4 Reviews)

Arduino Compatible LoRaWAN development board based on Atmega1284p MCU and RFM95 module

Designed by Low Power Solutions in France

2020-05-01T16:02:41.066Z-lorawan_megabrick.jpg

2020-05-01T16:02:41.066Z-lorawan_megabrick_02.jpg

2020-05-01T16:02:41.066Z-lorawan_megabrick_03.jpg

2020-02-26T23:37:34.347Z-rfm95_bb_04.jpg

2020-02-26T19:05:19.295Z-lorawan-megabrick4.png

2020-02-26T19:12:16.493Z-lorawan-megabrick5.png

Buy with confidence.

Our Tindie Guarantee protects your purchase from fraud. Learn More

Arduino Compatible LoRaWAN development board based on Atmega1284p MCU and RFM95 module

Description Arduino compatible LoRaWAN development board using Atmega1284p MCU (3.3v @ 16MHz) and RFM95 (868/915 MHz) module. Atmega1284p has 128KB of Flash and 16KB of SRAM in comparison to Atmega3…

Description

Arduino compatible LoRaWAN development board using Atmega1284p MCU (3.3v @ 16MHz) and RFM95 (868/915 MHz) module.
Atmega1284p has 128KB of Flash and 16KB of SRAM in comparison to Atmega328p (UNO, Pro Mini, etc) which has 32KB of Flash and 2KB of SRAM. For more details please see datasheet.
Bootloader is same as - MightCore from MCUDude.
Low power board without redundant components.
SMA and U.FL compatible antenna connector.
On board reset button and an LED.
Breadboard compatible.
The detailed dimension of the board is shown in one of the image. For quick reference : 64.01 x 25.91 mm
You can download the printable version of this documentation (schematic included) from "Specs and Docs" section.

Shipping Note

Fully Assembled LoRaWAN-megaBrick board without RFM95 module.
6 pin 90 degree male burg strip for FTDI-Adapter interface (based on stock).

Original Components

Both ATmega1284p (MCU) and MCP1703A (voltage regulator) are purchased from Mouser Electronics
16 MHz Ceramic Resonator from Murata Electronics having a tolerance of 0.5%

How to program?

First you need to add board support in Arduino IDE, please follow the below steps of Board Manager Installation (copied from MightCore for the sake of continuity).

Boards Manager Installation

This installation method requires Arduino IDE version 1.6.4 or greater.

Open the Arduino IDE.
Open the File > Preferences menu item.
Enter the following URL in Additional Boards Manager URLs: https://mcudude.github.io/MightyCore/package_MCUdude_MightyCore_index.json
Separate the URLs using a comma ( , ) if you have more than one URL
Open the Tools > Board > Boards Manager... menu item.
Wait for the platform indexes to finish downloading.
Scroll down until you see the MightyCore entry and click on it.
Click Install.
After installation is complete close the Boards Manager window.

Select MCU

In Arduino IDE, open Tools > Board: and select ATmega1284 under MightyCore.
Open Tools > Bootloader: and select Yes (UART0)
Open Tools > Pinout: and select Standard pinout
Open Tools > Clock: and select External 16 MHz
Open Tools > BOD: and select BOD 2.7V
Open Tools > Compiler LTO: and select LTO disabled
Open Tools > Variant: and select 1284P

How to enable LoRaWAN in Arduino code?

To enable LoRaWAN close three jumpers marked as D1, D2 and RST on the board.
A very famous LoRaWAN Arduino library is available to use : arduino-lmic
In the example codes of the library, change the pin mapping as shown below : const lmic_pinmap lmic_pins = { .nss = 4, .rxtx = LMIC_UNUSED_PIN, .rst = 3, .dio = {2, 22, 23},};

Arduino Pin Mapping

MCU and RFM95 pin mapping

Arduino Pin No.	RFM95	Comments
6	MISO
5	MOSI
7	SCK
4	NSS
3	RESET	via jumper RST
2	DIO0
22	DIO1	via jumper D1
23	DIO2	via jumper D2

MCU and LED Pin Mapping

An on board LED is available via jumper (JL) for testing purpose.
The LED is connected to Arduino pin number 21

Other important functionalities (for more details see image)

Arduino Pin No.	Function	Connected to	Comments
1	-	-	-
2	INT2	RFM95 DIO0	-
3	-	RFM95 RESET	via jumper RST
4	SS	RFM95 NSS	-
5	MOSI	RFM95 MOSI	-
6	MISO	RFM95 MISO	-
7	SCK	RFM95 SCK	-
8	RXD0	-	used by USB-to-Serial adapter to upload code
9	TXD0	-	used by USB-to-Serial adapter to upload code
10	RXD1/INT0	-	UART1 RX and interrupt-0
11	TXD1/INT1	-	UART1 TX and interrupt-1
12	OC1B	-	PWM
13	OC1A	-	PWM
14	OC2B	-	PWM
15	OC2A	-	PWM
16	I2C-SCL	-
17	I2C-SDA	-
18	-	-	-
19	-	-	-
20	-	-	-
21	-	LED	via jumper JL
22	-	RFM95 DIO1	via jumper D1
23	-	RFM95 DIO2	via jumper D2
A0/24	ADC0	-	-
A1/25	ADC1	-	-
A2/26	ADC2	-	-
A3/27	ADC3	-	-
A4/28	ADC4	-	-
A5/29	ADC5	-	-
A6/30	ADC6	-	-
A7/30	ADC7	-	-
AR	AREF	-	Analog Reference

Input Voltage Requirements

Input voltage VIN range 3.3v to 12v, but because of high dropout voltage at higher output current I would advise to use VIN range 4v to 12v
VIN is converted to 3.3v using an on board regulator (MCP1703A) with maximum output current of 250 mA.
Both MCU and RFM95 are powered from this regulated 3.3v
The regulated 3.3V is also available on one of the pins of the board (see images) and can be used to power external circuit.

Questions?

I am available to answer any kind of doubt regarding my product before and after purchase. Please feel free to ask.

Why did you make it?

Unavailability of inexpensive low power MCU boards with on board LoRa transceiver.

What makes it special?

Low Power.
Low Cost.
More memory (Flash & SRAM), interrupt, UART than Atmega328p MCU based Arduino boards.
Easy to use Arduino compatible LoRaWAN/LoRa board.
Original components purchased from authorized distributor - Mouser Electronics.

No country selected, please select your country to see shipping options.

Change Destination Country:

Review Breakdown

Average Ratings

Product: (5.00)

Documentation: (4.50)

Shipping: (5.00)

Communication: (4.50)

Urs | Oct. 21, 2021

great board for TTN V.3

Thanks for fast shipping (received within 3 day). my solder iron will warm up soon
I think this board is a great value for migrating to TTN V.3 with the new and huge MCCI library (probably you update the documentation?)
on the schematic there is missing JL, and RST on the board is marked as JP1. that's what I've seen so far

Michales / Parthena | Feb. 27, 2021

Perfection

I wanted this board for low power and extra flash to use MCCI LMIC. To my surprise 1284P has more pins than 32u4 / 328p and every pin is PCINT! Great for deep sleep projects that require multiple sources for wake-up.

To use with TinyLoRa use those pins (don't forget to solder RST)
`TinyLoRa lora = TinyLoRa(2, 4, 3); // IRQ, CS, RST`

To use the LED solder and add this line
`#define LED_BUILTIN PIN_PC5 // MegaBrick pin 21`

My cheap polymeter says 7μA with watchdog enabled. I didn't test power down. I suppose it will be lower as described.

A perfect buy. Thank you.

Only one suggestion. Maybe its' better to have a jumper for the LED to disable / enable at will?

Andreas | Nov. 11, 2020

Perfect start for my new project

My current wireless low power projects involve HopeRF RFM69 and/or RFM95 modules combined with the ATMega328P processor as it is used on Arduino UNO, Arduino Nano or Arduino Pro-Mini boards. Unfortunately I ran out of flash and RAM using the ATMega328P. The solution is the megaBrick as it offers 4 times as much of flash. The ATMega1284P processor mounted on the megaBrick is supported by the Arduoino IDE and the the "MightyCore" library (https://github.com/MCUdude/MightyCore).
The megaBrick was delivered within 2 days and looks professionally built. The boards are a bit bigger than a Arduino Nano, have a 3.3V LDO, a placeholder for a RFM69HCW or a RFM95 RF module, and a 16MHz crystal. The bootloader is preinstalled. Installing the core library and programming the board is done within minutes. Very nice!
Since the ATMega1284 is another AVR, it is very easy to migrate from a ATMega328P based project. In most cases just the GPIO ports have to be adopted/renamed, and that's it. Almost all Arduino libraries support the megaBrick, the "LowPower" library is to mention here especially.
For advanced users who want to change fuse settings, the megaBrick does not have a ISP adapter. Fortunately the required GPIO's are available at the pin headers. So I took a little piece of prototype PCB and built my own adapter which I can now plug on top of the megaBrick - when needed.
Conclusion:
Very nice product, very nice support, good price/performance ratio.

Response from Low Power Solutions | Nov. 14, 2020

Thank you so much :-) I am happy that you liked the board. Regarding ISP header, I am working on a baseboard that will also include a ISP header that might ease the job.

Steven | Oct. 10, 2020

Too good to disappear

I'm very pleased LPD/LPS are back again with this LoRaWAN development board. I was sad when the LoRaWAN Mini disappeared. I wanted to buy more but when it disappeared from Tindie I thought I would have to make my own... until I saw this updated version with more flash memory - great! To be honest the LoRaWAN Mini didn't have enough memory for both a LoRaWAN stack and an Adafruit soil sensor.

This megaBrick is professionally assembled to high quality with lead free solder (I don't like lead free for hobby use but lead free is the professional choice when you sell products). I would like to upload a photo but Tindie doesn't let me. It doesn't waste power on inefficient regulators or LEDs (unless you solder a link) so it can run for over a month on a 400mAh battery (with the 'LowPower' library), probably a lot longer with reduced transmissions (my tests sent a transmission every 10 minutes).

I wish LPS every success with this megaBrick and I hope it remains available for a long time. However in case it disappears soon, I recommend any purchaser to save/download the product page and schematic asap. Also a recommendation for LPS; the Tindie product page is good but doesn't print cleanly (Tindie website problem) so it would be helpful to have a downloadable PDF with the product specs, usage information and schematic.

Message to LPS: if you improve the technical documentation by making it downloadable (printing the Tindie page doesn't work) I will increase my documentation review from 4 to 5 stars.

Thanks

Response from Low Power Solutions | Nov. 14, 2020

Thank you so much for the great review, I appreciate :-). As per your feedback I have added the printable version (PDF) of the documentation which also includes schematic, please check product page.
Regarding your low power application. I am working on a base board for megaBrick which will include, apart from other useful things, an RTC that can be used as an external wake-up source. Using this, will allow going into deep sleep with RTC as a wake-up source.