[Arm-netbook] Wifi

[jonsmirl at gmail.com]

The cost for licensing is about $10,000 US for FCC and 7,000 euro for
EU. That's if you get it right the first time. It will be more if you
have to do repeated visits. Those costs are what stops all of the
lower volume commercial use of wifi. If you are going to make 500 of
something. Licensing costs are $40 a unit for approvals. Add in all of
the engineering, travel to approval sites, rework, etc and it is
probably $75 a unit. These costs are the same if you make 5 or 50,000
of something. In the 50,000 unit case they add $0.75. Pushing wifi
support down to the lowest level of the baseboard spreads it onto the
highest number of units.

Another complicating factor is that Ralink, etc won't sell their chips
in small volumes because they are afraid you will use them without
seeking FCC/EU approval.  They are supposed to be easy to get in China
from larger assembly houses reselling them in smaller volumes. The
Ralink chips use USB and have excellent drivers for all of them
already in Linux. You could wire them to the extra USB port.

This is a board we are doing that has a USB stick stuck on it. We
still have to go through FCC for it since it has an 802.15.4 radio. We
are using the stick because we can't acquire wifi chips in low volume
in the US.

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/VHnFkKyFxL54Xyw2QzrHE9MTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?feat=directlink

We are getting our USB wifi sticks at retail. When we need higher
volumes I'll check this place out that says all of its products are
already FCC certified. Most Asian vendors are not FCC certified.
http://ogemray.en.alibaba.com/productgrouplist-200609573/Wifi_module.html#products

If you are worried about development risk, just buy some Ralink USB
sticks and check them out. Here is a cheap place to get them:
http://s.dealextreme.com/search/ralink+usb.html?sort=Price

There is nothing on these sticks except for one chip and some
passives. Everyone clones the reference design. You would just clone
it as is onto the base board and use a PCB or chip antenna. External
antennas cost a lot more, you could save them for a later round.


-- 
Jon Smirl
jonsmirl at gmail.com