Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

ZigBee Low-Power Wireless Networking

Posted by michael on from the bzzz-bzzz dept.

asmithmd1 writes "Do you you have a great idea for a wireless device that really doesn't need the 1 Mbit/sec (and high power consumption) of Bluetooth? Well you will have a new choice soon, ZigBee. Zigbee is the trademark for IEEE 802.15 Personal Area network low data rate standard. Designed to run in low power 8 bit devices at data rates of 20k bits/second, a ZigBee node will run for months if not years on one set of batteries. With heavy hitters like Motorola and Phillips behind it and chips available soon for half the cost of bluetooth, it looks like it will become a reality."

5 of 155 comments (clear)

  1. Ah great by keesh · · Score: 4, Informative

    Yet more interference. As it is any time anyone uses a wireless phone (2.4GHz), bluetooth device (2.4GHz), radio headphones (2.4GHz) or microwave (everything) my 802.11b (2.4GHz) connection dies...

    1. Re:Ah great by dtmos · · Score: 3, Informative

      Keep in mind that 15.4 by design supports very low duty cycle operation--that's one way it gets its low average power consumption (by being asleep a lot). For this reason it will produce very little interference in most 2.4 GHz applications. In addition, 15.4 has a second physical layer, covering the European 868.0-868.6 MHz and the North/South American/Australian/etc. 902-928 MHz bands, so if 2.4 GHz interference troubles you, you can always move to the other bands.

  2. Correction by worst_name_ever · · Score: 4, Informative
    Zigbee is the trademark for IEEE 802.15 Personal Area network low data rate standard.

    Actually that's not entirely true. The 802.15.4 standard defines the physical radio behavior of the personal area network; ZigBee is the logical network and application software that runs on top of 802.15.

    Ref: ZigBee FAQ

    --

    In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
  3. About tens times off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    It is capable of connecting 255 devices per network. The spec supports data transmission rates of up to 250kbps at a range of up to 30 meters. ZigBee's technology is slower than 802.11b, at 11 megabits per second, and Bluetooth, at 1mbps, but it consumes significantly less power.

    Never believe what you don't read.

  4. Re:Where do they get the names from? by Glyndwr · · Score: 2, Informative

    Bluetooth I can answer, but I'm so lazy I'm going to quote this instead:

    By the way if, you're wondering where the Bluetooth name originally came from, it named after a Danish Viking and King, Harald Blatand (translated as Bluetooth in English), who lived in the latter part of the 10th century. Harald Blatand united and controlled Denmark and Norway (hence the inspiration on the name: uniting devices through Bluetooth). He got his name from his very dark hair which was unusual for Vikings, Blatand means dark complexion. However a more popular, (but less likely reason), was that Old Harald had a inclination towards eating Blueberries , so much so his teeth became stained with the colour, leaving Harald with a rather unique set of molars. And you thought your teeth were bad...


    Apparantly it was a prototype name that stuck (most of the early work was done by the Scandanavian mobile firms Nokia and Ericsson), and never got changed. I'd rather that than AMD's approach of using the coolest prototype names (Sharptooth, Sledgehammer, Clawhammer) and replacing them with frankly rubbish model names (K6-3, Opteron, Athlon 64).

    ZigBee is pretty rubbish though.

    --
    You win again, gravity!