802.15.4 to communicate with 802.11b

Wireless & IoT
1

can the zigbee specification communicate with 802.11b? that is, can a XBee device communicate with a Lantronix Matchport device?

2

IEEE 802.3 is not TCP/IP

and vice versa

IEEE 802.11 is not WiFi

and vice versa

IEEE 802.15.4 is not ZigBee. (ZigBee is a peer of the IP protocol)

and vice versa

IEEE 802.15.4 is not ISA 100.11a

and vice versa

Belatedly, answer to posted question:

No, IEEE 802.15.4 is a totally different MAC and PHY than is IEEE 802.11. '15.4 is a 2MHz bandwidth signal and 802.11 is 20MHz wide. And the modulation methods in each are not similar.

3

Didn’t think so. Just curious, are there bridges that can bridge the two in a mixed environment?

thanks for the reply

4

Ready made bridges may exist, but ZigBee doesn’t have a standardized protocol for the trunking to IP networks.

If you’re really looking for a bridgeable type network, ISA 100 defines this pretty well, as well as 6LoPan (IPv6 over 802.15.4)

5

rdxbam:
Didn’t think so. Just curious, are there bridges that can bridge the two in a mixed environment?

thanks for the reply

Yes, look on Digi’s website

6

The ConnectPort gateways from Digi are great, however depending upon your application they may be way too expensive.

Another option is to create a simple gateway. Get a WiPort or MatchPort module from Lantronix and route the serial output of the XBee to the serial input of the Lantronix module. Configure the Lantronix module to automatically connect to a particular IP address and port. Now everything addressed to that XBee will automatically be repeated over the Internet.

Alternately, you could plug one XPort into your computer and write a simple program to either directly repeat the serial traffic, or process it locally before sending modified information along.

7

thanks all & Faludi, i’ll delve more into the simple gateway which would be more cost effective for our situation it would seem. thanks for the tip on 6LoPan, i’ll look into that more also.