On Wed, Aug 10, 2016 at 11:52 AM, Valent Turkovic <valent@otvorenamreza.org> wrote:
On Tue, Aug 9, 2016 at 3:14 AM, Marc Juul <juul@labitat.dk> wrote:
> It's a case-less board with a single 2.4 GHz radio but it really is $5
> including tax and shipping and you can buy as many as you want.
>
> They're estimated to ship in November.
>
>
> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/onion/omega2-5-iot-computer-with-wi-fi-powered-by-linux
>
> I ordered 10 of them for mesh projects.
>
> It's a bit sad that they don't have the ethernet broken out since that would
> make them useful as mesh routers that we could just hand out left and right.
> We could make ethernet breakout boards for them ourselves if we feel like
> doing some soldering, but given that you can buy an OpenWRT router for ~$12
> with two ethernet ports and a case it's not obvious that this is worth it.
>
> If we're ok with just one ethernet port then we could buy a bunch of $1.75
> USB ethernet adapters. Assume $1 for a dollar store plastic case and we then
> have usable mesh routers for $8 a pop.
>
> They're probably more useful as interfaces between e.g. LoRa hardware and
> sensors and such where you just want it to be small, low power and cheap but
> still want to run e.g. a full meshing protocol.
>
> --
> marc/juul


Hi Marc,
I was also on same KS page looking at their kits which is $20 if you
want power board, AFAIK $5 version you can't even power up! :(


Yeah they just need 3.3v power in. A voltage regulator with 3.3v output will cost you 50 cent or less.
 
A then again you are missing ethernet ports, usb over ethernet is not
something I'll go for, so when you count all of those shields it is
quite expensive device...

Well you could fairly easily solder an ethernet transformer and RJ45 port but it's probably not worth the trouble to save a couple of bucks.
 

I was thinking also to get few Omega2 devices but decided that for my
use case which is that I need a device in a nice small case, ethernet
port, small dimenstions, usb port, and external antennas it is much
better to go for some of GLiNet devices... check them out...
http://www.gl-inet.com/

Which devices are you buying for $15 ?

We have been able to get the Western Digital My Net N600 for ~$10 a pop but that was a limited time thing and we can't get them any more. We're now looking at the NEXX WT3020F as a possible super cheap mesh node. We've bought them before for $12.50 shipped. They will suck but they will be enough to make a VPN'ed hotspot that advertises peoplesopen.net and have two ethernet ports so can be extended with our extender node system.

--
marc/juul