RF Digital’s RFD21733 is a fully FCC- and CE-compliant 2.4-GHz ultra-low-power (ULP) wireless module supplied in a tape-and-reel format for automated placement on printed-circuit boards. The module is powered by the nRF24LEI transceiver from the company’s official design partner, Nordic Semiconductor ASA.

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The RFD21733 comes with RF Digital’s frequency-hopping spread-spectrum (FHSS) firmware or, alternatively, with no pre-loaded firmware (RFD21731). Both versions feature a built-in chip antenna that is matched, tuned, and optimized for radiation pattern. A 32-kHz crystal required for precision timing when operating in a low-duty-cycle ULP mode is integrated into the RFD21732 version, which also has no pre-loaded firmware. Full access to the wireless module is provided by three digital I/O lines, a program line, a reset line, and power (+V) and ground (GND) connections.

The Nordic Semiconductor nRF24LE1 enables single-chip implementation of wireless applications. The nRF24LE1’s radio is a fully featured nRF24L01+ 2.4-GHz transceiver core that includes Nordic’s proven Enhanced ShockBurst hardware link layer. It delivers true ULP operation with peak currents low enough to run on coin cell batteries.

The nRF24LE1 integrates an enhanced 8051 mixed-signal microcontroller core that requires fewer clock cycles per instruction than legacy 8051 devices. Most instructions need just one or two clock cycles, leading to an average performance improvement of 8X using the MIPS benchmark. This high performance combined with 16 kbytes of on-chip flash and 1 kbyte of SRAM ensures that the processing platform is powerful enough to run both the RF protocol stack and application layer with ease.

The RDF21733 costs $8.00 each in volume quantities.

• Nordic Semiconductor ASA
  www.nordicsemi.com
• RF Digital
  www.rfdigital.com