Date Approved

2-2019

Graduate Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Engineering (M.S.E.)

Degree Program

School of Engineering

First Advisor

Dr. Robert Bossemeyer

Second Advisor

Dr. Bruce Dunne

Third Advisor

Dr. Nabeeh Kandalaft

Academic Year

2018/2019

Abstract

Wireless communication is one of the most advanced technological developments of this era. Wireless technology enables both short-range and long-range services. Today, there are several different wireless communication technologies in existence. Each has its characteristics different from another one. This thesis will implement three short-range wireless technologies in star connection and compare the performance in the wireless network.

For this thesis, the performance of three different RF protocols - a proprietary packet protocol called Enhanced ShockBurst in nRF24L01+, Bluetooth Low Energy, and a special Wi- Fi protocol ESP-Now was compared. The general concept was to establish a star network for these protocols consisting of each module as a central hub while the others as end nodes, where all modules were configured as transceivers. The wireless star network for the proprietary radio frequency protocol Enhanced ShockBurst Feature was implemented using a transceiver device built by a Norwegian company Nordic Systems called the nRF24L01+. Similar wireless networks were also implemented for ESP-Now and BLE in an ESP32 development board. ESPNow is a proprietary radio frequency protocol developed by a Chinese company called Espressif that allows multiple devices to connect over 2.4 GHz channels using elements of a Wi-Fi protocol without requiring a router to form a network, while Bluetooth Low Energy is a wireless personal network designed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (Bluetooth SIG).

Different performance metrics such as throughput (kbps), range (ft), current consumption (mA) and network routing recovery time (s) were measured in the network. From the implementations tested, it was found that the nRF24L01+ has maximum throughput when transmitting large payloads (344% higher than ESP-Now in 32 bytes payload size, BLE throughput was 50.50 bps in 32 bytes payload size), least current consumption (ESP-Now consumes 714% more current and BLE consumes 409.7% more current), and shortest network recovery time (nRF24L01+ took 335us, ESP-Now took 31ms and BLE took 1.3s on average), while the Wi-Fi based ESP-Now has a maximum range (30.53% better than BLE and 120% better than nRF24L01+).

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