Hi, we are having problems connecting the Spark to wifi using the SmartConfig protocol on mixed b/g/n networks where all clients are connected via WiFi N.
Three specific instances have failed us.
Nexus 5 connected to another Nexus 5 hotspot. SmartConfig will never find the spark in this situation.
Mixed mode B/G/N network on a Netgear N900 home router with about 6 clients all connected via N. SmartConfig never succesfully connects the spark.io
FritzBox router in mixed mode. SmartConfig will not work unless many tries are attempted. Sometimes 30-40 tries (yes this takes almost an hour to test!) are required.
In all of these cases, forcing the networks to use ONLY B/G (excluding the Nexus 5 case because there is no way to specify the protocol) allows the SmartConfig to work properly.
Sure, we could provide credentials over USB, but this is not a viable solution for a product. Is there any chance the team will be releasing a version of the spark.io using one of the newer CC3100 or CC3200 which support WiFi N? Clearly the CC3000 chip does not do well in mixed mode environments (even when router support is properly configured).
Yup, weāre researching new modules, and alternative ways of passing your Wi-Fi credentials to the core, so this will be solved in future versions. You can already use the spark-cli ( https://github.com/spark/spark-cli ), or any serial terminal to enter the credentials manually, but SmartConfig does have issues when the device sending the credentials is locked in 802.11n only mode (The nexus in particular is bad about this).
Hi @Dave,
Thanks for the reply. Glad to hear you guys are working on things. The sooner you can share your goals and timelines with us the better. I really think the Spark.io has the best āideaā in the now exploding world of IoT platforms and so my criticism are only for the betterment and due to my excitement about the platform. The execution has fallen short in a few cases where the end user isnāt a āhacker typeā and I donāt think building a business on one-off āhacker typesā makes much sense. Iād love to see you guys succeed and build a product around things which ship lots of units ā and itās not there yet. Cheers to your efforts.
Thanks, we try to make the experience as easy as possible, and weāre very excited about all the products built on the Spark platform that are shipping in the near future. Weāll always keep improving.
@OrangeOctober I have the same problem and i also working on IoT product with SparkCore heart (SparkCore inside - like intel). Like you said, the way to connect to the internet should be really easy (as typing the wifi code). @Dave, will it be new ādeep updateā or new hardware?
Any news welcome - Iād go so far as to say in its current form the Spark Core is useless for a consumer focused (ie production scale) product all the while it doesnāt ājust workā with current consumer phones/ tablets etc without techie tweakingā¦ which is a real shame!
Iād like to +1 this issue as being a deal breaker for the development we are considering.
The API is beautiful. The cloud interaction is awesome. Choosing a chip that cannot see 5GHZ packets was a questionable choice. What are the options for a production ready product besides swapping the wifi chip with another that supports n? Isnāt it the case that SmartConfig will never be able to configure the current spark from a device locked to 5GHZ regardless of firmware updates? If there is an possibility of solving this with software I would be interested to hear about it. From what I have read, itās not possible with this chip, period.
Can anyone inform us that this is something that is being planned? I would love to continue tinkering with the spark, but if there are not significant plans being discussed to use a different chip that supports b/g/n I need to look elsewhere.
Iām also interested in some feedback from the dev team about why the currently limited chip was chosen over versions that can see 5GHZ.
I only post this as polite feedback! The device is really cool. If you guys are looking to sell 100 of them instead of 1, this issue should be at the very top of your list of development goals.
Like I said before, Iām working on a product that the SparkCore is the heart of it. We are in the middle of a process and now is the time to decide if we āall inā with the SparkCore or we need to choose something else. I really want to continue with you, I think your product is good and the community you built is great.
The biggest problem I have so far is that āfirst time smart configā, as you know, you canāt do it with ānā type wifi, mimo or 5GHz routers (unless your smartphone is so old to just have āgā type wifi).
You mention that should be a software solution for the first time config. Can you say when will we see something new?
It will be drop-in compatible, but some of the pins might be slightly different; weāre still developing the hardware, and working to make it as compatible as possible.
Now, after you (pre-)announced the SparkCore2, what will be the āfirst time smart configā there? Itās going to be the same or as AP (like the CC3200)?
