I have a Sixfab cellular modem hat on a Raspberry Pi 4, which also acts as a wireless router. The device lives in my camping trailer, and is powered exclusively by solar (and LiFePO4 batteries). I have a second Pi running Victron’s VRM system, logging all sorts of data about the battery, solar energy, and the environment, and sending it all out to the web via the WiFi from the Sixfab unit.
I saw this Pico LTE device and I am intrigued. Can it do a similar task of being a Wifi router? I am imagining how little power draw this thing must have vs. my Pi 4 with its modem hat and cooling fan on in the summer. The Pico LTE seems like an elegant little unit.
I’d love to hear both from the developer, but also from users. What do you think?
It’s running MicroPython and most of the, “network,” functionality is driven on the actual LTE modem- so you’d have to figure out how to make that go with Zephyr on the Pico- and then figure out how to make the Cat-1M module do that as it’s all AT commands and everything (and I do mean that) is ran off of AT commands sent to it- whether you’re talking HTTP requests or MQTT ones. It all lives on the LTE module and the Pico’s just there to provide some, “what to go do with yourself,” to the module, all done in MicroPython.
It’s probably doable. But is it worth only a megabit or so of bandwidth?
And, to answer my question, if you’re talking an IoT OTA protocol like Thread, it MIGHT be worth the effort to make THAT sort of gateway…but this isn’t geared for that class of work, unfortunately.
No problem. The thing’s this nice device, but it’s got some rather unfortunate sharp, sharp edges that they should’ve been MUCH more clear on, including this little subject.