ESP8266 Community Forum

- Fri Oct 15, 2021 10:10 am #92626 I'm working on ESP Now where on receiver end I'm going to put 12 ESP-12 modules on one PCB at about 10mm distance, six modules on one side and six on other side of same PCB.

I was not able to find hardware specifications for such scenario can someone help me if that will work?

- Fri Oct 15, 2021 11:12 am #92627 Depends on whether you want them all working at the same time

I suspect the RF will become a problem. I have all my ESP's at least one meter apart. If they're closer together, I don't really see the need to have so many? If you need more I/O pins, there are other (imho better) solutions.

- Fri Oct 15, 2021 12:29 pm #92628 Yes, they will work at same time.

I'm trying to receive data from 12 devices at this time (later it will be 50 devices)
I'm using ESP now protocol to reduce power consumption for battery operated nodes.

If I use only one ESP to listen and receive data problem is that it does not connect to internet at same time, there is work around where at client node we find the channel and send data, but in this case finding channel increase the power consumption and there is no point to use ESP NOW anymore,

I found only way to reduce power consumption like (100ms) for sending a message if both devices are using ESP NOW and slave device (acting as server) is not connected to internet directly.

That's why my work around is 12 ESP listener modules for 12 ESP transmitting nodes, after receiving data from node those listeners will send data to a master ESP through SPI who will then send data to internet.

Please advise if you know any other alternates solution for a scenario where 50 nodes want to send data to a server and server is sending to internet, nodes are battery based max transmission time could be 100ms <?

- Sat Oct 16, 2021 2:33 am #92631 Looks like you're having a "software" issue, not a hardware issue?

Can't you use I2C, so you can have all clients on one bus towards one ESP? You could do the same trick on SPI but it's harder because every client would need to have it's own CS line. You could, though, and may do so, implement an "address select header" to the SPI protocol and the ESP fully supports it.

If the ESP needs to be the client/slave, it's more complex, but not impossible I think.