Re:Liberating Wi-Fi on the ESP32 [video]
by Aurornis on Friday December 27, 2024 @11:10PM
(#42528476)
The Espressif chips are WiFi ICs. You can buy the bare chips, connect over SDIO, load the hosted firmware, and use them as WiFi radio chips.
For volume production (10K, 100K, or more units) you can get other WiFi ICs that are cheaper than buying an ESP32 module. The difference is that other companies don’t care about engaging the hobby and low volume markets so they don’t put an effort into making them cheap.
If you’re doing one-off builds, you’re at the mercy of whoever decides to make an effort to make things cheap and accessible. Some companies deliberately make their products hard or even impossible to access for hobbyists because it’s not worth it unless you’re the hobbyist market leader (Espressif)
For volume production (10K, 100K, or more units) you can get other WiFi ICs that are cheaper than buying an ESP32 module. The difference is that other companies don’t care about engaging the hobby and low volume markets so they don’t put an effort into making them cheap.
If you’re doing one-off builds, you’re at the mercy of whoever decides to make an effort to make things cheap and accessible. Some companies deliberately make their products hard or even impossible to access for hobbyists because it’s not worth it unless you’re the hobbyist market leader (Espressif)