Connecting a SAM R34 SiP/SAM R34 Module LoRaWAN® End Device to a LoRaWAN Network Server

The SAM R34/R35 is a highly-integrated LoRa^® System-in-Package (SiP) family which includes an ultra-low power, high-performance 32-bit microcontroller (MCU), LoRa transceiver, and software stack. SAM R34 devices support LoRaWAN^® long-range wireless protocol.

The SAM R34 Xplained Pro is a hardware platform designed to evaluate the SAM R34 family of LoRa devices. This FCC-, ISED-, and RED-certified board is not only an evaluation platform but also an excellent reference design for developing SAM R34-based LoRa end-node applications. This kit is supported by Microchip Studio, an integrated development platform, which provides predefined application examples. The evaluation kit also provides easy access to various features of the ATSAMR34J18B device and offers additional peripherals to extend the features of the board and ease the development of custom designs.

The WLR089U0 modules are based on the ultra-low power, highly integrated SAM R34/35 family of LoRa ICs. This standalone module integrates 256 KB of Flash and 40 KB RAM providing enough memory for the LoRaWAN stack, as well as for the application user code. The module includes an on-board u.FL antenna connector for ease of use and comes in a compact 17.5 x 13 mm package making it ideal for space-constrained battery-powered applications.

The WLR089 Xplained Pro is a hardware platform designed to evaluate the WLR089U0 LoRa modules. This kit integrates the FCC-, RED- and ISED-certified WLR089U0 module and an excellent reference design for developing SAM R34 module-based LoRa end-node applications. This kit is supported by Microchip Studio, an integrated development platform, which provides predefined application examples. The evaluation kit also provides easy access to various features of the WLR089U0 device and offers additional peripherals to extend the features of the board and ease the development of custom designs.

The features of the SAM R34/R35 and WLR089U0 enable their use as end devices in wide-area networks like LoRaWAN. LoRaWAN is a Media Access Control (MAC) protocol for wide-area networks. It is designed to enable low-powered devices to interact with internet-connected applications over long-range connections. LoRaWAN can be mapped to the second and third layers of the OSI model. It makes use of LoRa or FSK modulation in Industrial, Scientific, and Medical (ISM) radio bands. The LoRaWAN protocols are defined by the LoRa Alliance^® and formalized in the LoRaWAN Specification which can be downloaded from the LoRa Alliance website.

This series will provide an overview of LoRaWAN networking and discuss how to provision Gateways and End Devices to Network Servers. The series concludes with information on how to configure SAM R34-based LoRaWAN application examples to be able to join the network server/join server based on the provisioning parameters used to register/enroll a device.