Rainbow Electronics RC2200 - Manual (Page 7)

RC220x
 2005 Radiocrafts AS RC220x Data Sheet (rev. 1.0) Page 7 of 17
IEEE 802.15.4
The IEEE 802.15.4 standard, approved in May 2003, provides a worldwide standard for
Personal Area Networks or short distance wireless networks for low data rate solutions with
long battery life and very low complexity. It defines a Physical layer (PHY) and a Medium
Access Control layer (MAC) and is the basis for the open ZigBee protocol or proprietary
protocols. The typical applications are home and building automation, industrial control and
monitoring systems, wireless sensor networks, remote controls and consumer electronics.
The module complies with the IEEE 802.15.4 standard operating in the 2.45 GHz band. It
uses direct sequence spread spectrum (DSSS) with 2 Mc/s chip rate giving a raw data rate of
250 kbit/s 16 channels are available in the 2.45 GHz band, channel 11 – 26 (channels 0-10
are reserved for use in the 868 and 915 MHz bands).
For more information on the standard, please consult www.ieee802.org/15/pub/TG4.html
Reference:
IEEE std 802.15.4 -2003: Wireless Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical layer (PHY)
specifications for Low Rate Wireless Personal Area Networks (LR-WPANs)
http://standards.ieee.org/getieee802/download/802.15.4-2003.pdf
The ZigBee Protocol
The ZigBee Alliance is an association of companies working together to enable reliable, cost-
effective, low-power, wirelessly networked, monitoring and control products based on an open
global standard. The ZigBee Alliance is a rapidly growing, non-profit industry consortium of
leading semiconductor manufacturers, technology providers, OEMs and end-users worldwide.
Membership is open to all. The ZigBee Alliance, in collaboration with the IEEE, is defining the
network, security, and application layers above the IEEE 802.15.4 PHY and MAC layers. This
cooperation has resulted in an easy-to-use, standards-based wireless network platform
optimised for wireless monitoring and control applications. For more information about the
ZigBee Alliance and the ZigBee standard, please consult www.zigbee.org
The module is intended for using the ZigBee protocol. However, other proprietary network
protocols can also be implemented using the module.
The ZigBee stack implementation from Chipcon/Figure 8 Wireless is recommended as it
provides seamless integration with the module. However, third party stack implementations
can also be used provided they support the Chipcon MAC firmware.