7 years, 3 months ago.

Bluetooth, module or chip ?

Hello all,

I need add bluetooth to my hardware, I never worked with bluetooth before, so, I was wondering which approach to use. I did a quick research on internet and found some solutions using a bluetooth mudule integrated IC like CC2540 and CC2541 from TI, I also find solutions using a board module like RN41 and RN42 from microchip and solutions using a dongle.

I need to add bluetooth service to my hardware, however, I want it inside the box with the hardware, and not using USB if possible, so, I think dongle possibility is discarted in my opinion. So, remains the doubt between module and chip.

I read this article in Digikey site:

http://www.digikey.com/en/articles/techzone/2013/may/integrating-bluetooth-technology-into-embedded-system-designs

It says:

"If your team has sufficient RF expertise and the software skills to integrate the controller’s application code with the code required to support the protocol stack, investing 12 to 18 months of development time will be handsomely repaid by a more efficient design and lower production costs. "

I would like to know what is necessary to develop a bluetooth solution and integrate it to an embedded design, I mean, what I need to add bluetooth to my hardware, starting by the ICs and not using a module ?

About module, I came across with two types of modules. One of them is CC2541, the CC2541 is a true single-chip Bluetooth low energy solution that includes the radio, an 8051 MCU to run the Bluetooth low energy stack and application, and integrated flash. It communicates by I2c The other module is the RN41 from microchip, it is a board solution and has antenna and communicates by UART.

With CC2541 I will need to make the antenna on my printed circuit and with RN41 not. But the price of RN41 is 4.5 times the CC2541's price. Probably I wiil need some hundreds of units, so... I'm wondering, besides the antenna, how much more work would I have using the cc2541 instead of the RN41?

Is there another solutions ? Any tip will be very appreciated.

With my bests regards,

Daniel.