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Hi Joost -

Thank you for the comprehensive feedback;

I have indeed, both from Paticle directly as well as this forum. There are some users in here that has helped me a lot and I am sure I really pushed their patience to the limit :smiley: I am sorry to hear you have not had the same experience.

Hmm... Have you dealt with OEM manufacturers before? I my previous ±20 years of experience in IT (hardware) dealing with parts manufacturers abroad, especially OEM which it seems in this case you mentioned, is not ideal. That is, If they will even deal with you as and end user. I recall us trying to work with several, Foxconn being one of them as they manufactured the ECS boards and some other components we used at the time. In short, we had much more joy in dealing with ECS. Suppose if you are going to order 10 000's of units on a very regular basis, it might be worth your while.

I fully agree...

I am aware of this yes. The original post though was choice between NodeMCU and Photon if I recall correctly. For me at least, the way I had to handle OTA was not as seamless as it is with Particle. Coming from Arduino and NodeMCU, I can only offer my humble opinion and that is that I am having much better success with Particle Photons, Xenon and Argon (on all fronts) than I have had over the last couple of years with NodeMCU (more specifically with ESP8266 chipset). Also the way the 3rd Gen devices handles mesh is far more stable than what I was able to achieve when using NoceMCU. I have to admit I did not try the NodeMCU with ESP32 chipset. Again, only my humble opinion and experience :slight_smile:

I appreciate the advice. As I mentioned, I am relatively new, so in my opinion, the "step up" from Arduino/NodeMCU to Particle was a good one for me. I have not explored any further than Particle as the modules seem more than capable of carrying the weight at the moment. I also prefer sticking to a single brand for as long as possible and can honestly say nothing but good things form my experiences in dealing (and using) with Particle.

Thanks @joost enjoying these discussions and and very eager to learn more... these help a ton!!

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The forum has been great, quite a few are absolute great contributors...

Hmm… Have you dealt with OEM manufacturers before? I my previous ±20 years of experience in IT
Ah yes you could say that :slight_smile: Been all over Asia, Europe as well as the USA for parts and manufacturing. For low quantities, nobody should do anything difficult with an OEM of course. 10K might not even be a good break for some parts. What I was pointing out is that the Photon platform is not made by Particle and can be directly obtained from a distributor such as AVNet, Digikey, Mouser - you name it. Getting it from Particle means the part has been 'registered' in their system. But if you need no fleet management or cloud functions, you could just get the part "directly" from the distributor.

I am working with the P1 and since Particle has had issues delivering this and IMHO has been unclear about what the delivery issues are, I have been considering other ways to get this part. I need no fleet management nor cloud functions.

I can only offer my humble opinion and that is that I am having much better success with Particle Photons, Xenon and Argon (on all fronts) than I have had over the last couple of years with NodeMCU (more specifically with ESP8266 chipset).
True, I have had not much joy with my (short brush) experience with the ESP8266. But the Photon has been a rocky road too; WiFI connectivity, memory limitations and WiFi noise creeping into analog input to name the most uncomfortable issues (for me).

The new devices have mesh and that is very interesting and compelling to work with - but the role out has been painful and I have wasted just too much time on making it work (year ago) - things may be much more stable now but I am no longer willing to try that all out.

I appreciate the advice. As I mentioned, I am relatively new, so in my opinion, the “step up” from Arduino/NodeMCU to Particle was a good one for me .

Completely understandable and recognizable - I had the same experience going Photon after Arduino, RedBear and some TI platforms. And I would probably still grab a photon if I need to do something quickly for a project whereby the device doesn't matter much. But the platform is very limited in memory - try connect to AWS with TLS and there is just enough FLASH left to do not much more than temperature measurements. Some of the latest OSes gobble up so much RAM too, running an 2K FFT is difficult. But if any of that is not needed, the particle firmware is generally easy to get into as long as WiFi issues do not rear their ugly head again.

I also prefer sticking to a single brand for as long as possible

I left that a long time ago, been burned by that loyalty too much (sticking to Motorola CPUs/MPUs being the most painful experience in my life). But I would not swap out chips lightly either, they come with an entire infrastructure that is much more than just the chip. So writing code in the most portable way possible and documented for future self & team is my survival tactic. Changing chip sets is never easy and fun but easier with good coding habits.

Anyway, for now, you're having a good time with the Photon - chears to that, and I will drink a good Belgium ale on your health tonight :smiley:

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@joost

Ah ok, I was not aware of this. I have been getting most of my components from DigiKey and RS Components, aside from Particle products that is. Good service so far in delivering products, but I must say, I think I would prefer dealing with Particle when it comes to returns etc. It took me about a month to get RS to understand they left out a component in one of my orders... they finally acknowledged and then sent me the wrong one instead :laughing:

I hope this has been resolved as I built couple of prototypes using Photon's but if the project takes off I was considering P1 instead.

Fortunately I only recently acquired the 3rd gen devices for a project. ±10 Xenon's and couple of Argon's that need to work together to manage our mixing system in our Coffee Roastery. So far much smoother ride than when we tried this with NodeMCU+ESP8266 combo.

I am mostly posting data to Ubidots and seems to be without incident so far. I would guess the most strain I have put on a Photon was with a current sensor project where I am taking ±800 readings per second, calculating average and then publishing to Ubidots (1 per second) to get as close to "Real time data" as I can. Not sure if I can push it even further, but this seems to be sufficient for now.

I still have to learn this... haha. Being in tech for quite a bit of time I know there can be teething problems which I am ok to go through. I guess as long as I have an honest relationship with the supplier, I value that enough to stick. I agree with the rest... doing my best to learn C in a proper manner to avoid future challenges. Just so much to learn... C, Eagle, Fusion... :exploding_head:

As I mentioned I am quite new to IoT but an eager learner and enjoying this a lot, much more than IT. My responses to posts are in the hope to help 'fellow newbies' with some of the challenges I faced when starting. As you mentioned, nothing worse than waiting time on trying to make something work that just won't do.

hahaha... thanks!!! Enjoy :beers:

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Can someone from Particle comment on this?