Amarvir's Tech Blog

[amarvir02]

DIY WIFI Router

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9/7/21
Hi, i’m back! With it being July, it’s time to start funtime tech nonsense!
I’m looking to build my own wifi router with some sort of SBC or mini-ITX embedded board, along with using a wifi card.
My options for the wifi card are either £30 on the intel AX210 2x2 wifi 6E card, or I just go f*** it and splurge several hundred on one of Qualcomm’s 4x4 wifi 6 cards.

Here’s a few cards:

• Decently priced, might consider: JINYUSHI Per Brand new Compex WLE1216V5 20 Qualcomm QCA9984 chip 1733 Mbps 4x4 Wave 2 802.11ac/a/n Mini PCIe modem in magazzino|modem|qualcomm modem - AliExpress

• Ridiculous: Compex PN01.1 802.11ax Wi Fi 6 M.2 NGFF interface Wi Fi Modulo Qualcomm Atheros QCN9074 circuito integrato single band 2.4GHz 4 × 4 MIMO Modulo| | - AliExpress

• Monstrous Heatsink: QNAP QWA-AC2600 WiFi 5 PCI Adapter w/ 4 x RP-SMA Male Antennas (2533 Mbps AC) (broadbandbuyer.com)

• Intel wifi 6E : Tri band Intel AX210 AX200 8265AC AX210 wireless Wi Fi 6E 802.11AX 5374M scheda di rete wireless desktop Bluetooth 5.2 supporta 6G|Network Cards| - AliExpress

As far as a board goes, I’ve been mainly eyeing this ASUS AT4NM10T-I board:

• ASUS AT4NM10T I Integrated Atom D425 CPU MiNi PC Motherboards DDR3L 2GX2 Mini ITX Desktop Motherboard Set|Motherboards| - AliExpress
  It’s a single 45nm atom core chip, so probably not the best, but I wonder what the min spec I should be consider is for a router. I know many routers run on quad core low end arm chips, so I looked for other boards:

• JINYUSHI for Compex AR9342 WPJ342 802.11n PCIE expansion 2.4G/5G network card Power Wireless AP Embedded|Communications Antennas| - AliExpress

• N3050 A/K20CE/DP_MB Desktop Motherboard For ASUS Mini ITX DDR3 SATA3 USB3.0 Used PC Motherboard 100% Tested|Motherboards| - AliExpress

Also, here’s a great site for better understanding wifi and how the products/marketing works: Understand Wi-Fi 4/5/6/6E (802.11 n/ac/ax) (duckware.com)

The reason I so desperately am gonna get a mini-ITX embedded board is that with some of the plywood that’s lying around in my house, I can build a case for it out of that, which should be fun.

[amarvir02]

Desk

Time for a new desk. I’ve had my current one for many years, and haven’t had anything with it, with the major downside of it being it’s shallowness which has forced me into my current desk setup:

See if you can spot the phone charging dock…

Anyway, with the plywood I have lying around, I need to do something with it, so using most of it for a new desk also seems useful.
As such, I’ll need to get a good sketchup of a new desk desgin.
So to start off with, I have here a solidworks folder containing a model of that current desk.
Desk.zip (863.1 KB)

I’ll see what to do about a new desk

[FaunCB]

Wow my desk is full of trash and shows yours up by a bit. And here I’d expect you to have a cave with what you do in here xD

[amarvir02]

I forgot! Cookies! Made em last week!

[anon86748826]

I want to use this site without cookies!

[FaunCB]

‘o’

Wish I had an oven to make cookies in

[The_DM_Barlow]

I like the thrift-store toaster ovens for cookies and such. Mandates a smaller batch, which is nice.

[amarvir02]

Yeah, the recipe I use is for 8 cookies (I scaled it up to 16 this time), but those ovens can typically fit 4 at a time, which is a nice small size that allows you to do a few batches.

Unfortunately, I haven’t had much time to post all the things I aimed to work on in the titular post, since I’m currently spending 8hrs a day on a factory job to earn me some cash for when I return to uni. I’ll see how much I can get done over the next month and after I quit.

PS: Don’t do this factory work if you can avoid it. It sucks, and you’re effectively a mindless drone the whole day, spending all your time and energy not learning or achieving anything exciting.

[FaunCB]

I worked somewhere where all I did was put a thing and 2 nails in a press, I hated it.

[The_DM_Barlow]

Over and over again, I’d hate that too.

[amarvir02]

Day off:
Note, don’t accidentally spill your mint extract into the dough. Unless you want it extra minty!

[amarvir02]

I got bored the other day and did a NMOS NOT gate.
It works well switching nicely between below threshold voltage and above, turning on and off.

Used the linear regulator (blue and black board thingy), to take the USB 5V and use the inbuilt variable transformer (variometer? Can’t remember the name) up to 10V

So
VDD = 10V
VGS = 5V
And R_D = 5.6k Ohm
LED current limiting resistor = 1k Ohm

I did a CMOS one aswell (no pics), and it works good as well, switching between two distinct voltage levels, but they’re both above threshold voltage, so it lights up either way

I originally drew the diagram the same as the FET amplifiers I learnt in lectures, but acter scouring through my notes, I found another diagram that didn’t need transistors: between the ground and gate; nor the source and ground.

I later thought about why they were unnecessary and I hope below explains it well enough