I'm hoping to be able to increase the range on the Raspberry Pi Zero that I'm running EspruinoHub on. And that should mean I can place devices further away, right?
Yes, that'd be fine. Are you using WiFi? If you could disable WiFi on the Pi Zero you may see an improvement too even without a dongle, since AFAIK they have to use the same aerial.
Is the dongle being sold in the Espruino store the best option?
Probably not - but the reason I started stocking them is I found it was pretty hard to buy long range Bluetooth LE dongles anywhere.
Another option is to use multiple Raspberry Pis in different locations. It's not something EspruinoHub supports yet but it's something I've been tempted to add.
Does anyone have any experience of it making an improvement to their range?
I just did a quick test:
// standard USB BLE dongle
c7:4b:2e:c6:f5:45 (Bangle.js f545) RSSI -54
de:70:d9:0c:eb:86 (Espruino NRF52832DK) RSSI -57
// Long Range USB BLE dongle
c7:4b:2e:c6:f5:45 (Bangle.js f545) RSSI -44
de:70:d9:0c:eb:86 (Espruino NRF52832DK) RSSI -41
c6:a8:1a:1f:87:16 (Bangle.js 8716) RSSI -68
c8:32:c2:56:fd:aa (Bangle.js fdaa) RSSI -66
So it's adding maybe 10-15 dBm signal strength, and seeing devices that the other one didn't. Some of that would be due to positioning of the standard USB dongle next to the PC chassis, but even so it's a decent improvement.
I'm biased though so I'd be interested to see what others think.
Espruino is a JavaScript interpreter for low-power Microcontrollers. This site is both a support community for Espruino and a place to share what you are working on.
Yes, that'd be fine. Are you using WiFi? If you could disable WiFi on the Pi Zero you may see an improvement too even without a dongle, since AFAIK they have to use the same aerial.
Probably not - but the reason I started stocking them is I found it was pretty hard to buy long range Bluetooth LE dongles anywhere.
Another option is to use multiple Raspberry Pis in different locations. It's not something EspruinoHub supports yet but it's something I've been tempted to add.
I just did a quick test:
So it's adding maybe 10-15 dBm signal strength, and seeing devices that the other one didn't. Some of that would be due to positioning of the standard USB dongle next to the PC chassis, but even so it's a decent improvement.
I'm biased though so I'd be interested to see what others think.