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  • Author Author: rscasny
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Nordic nRF9160 Development Kit

rscasny

Table of contents

About the Nordic nRF9160 DK

Nordic Semi LogoThe nRF9160 DK is a pre-certified, single-board development kit for evaluation and development on the nRF9160 SiP for LTE-M, NB-IoT and GNSS. It also includes an nRF52840 board controller that, for example, can be used to build a Bluetooth Low Energy gateway.

It has a dedicated LTE-M and NB-IoT antenna that supports a wide range of bands to operate globally. LTE bands B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B8, B12, B13, B14, B17, B18, B19, B20, B25, B26, B28 and B66 have been certified. See the Nordicsemi.com/9160cert for more details.

A dedicated patch antenna for GNSS, and a 2.4 GHz antenna for Bluetooth LE are included on the board. SWF RF connectors are available for the LTE-M/NB-IoT and 2.4 GHz antennas. A connector is also available to attach an external GNSS antenna.

 All GPIOs and interfaces (SPI/TWI/UART) are available via connectors. It is Arduino Uno Rev3 compatible, meaning it can be easily interfaced with external device shields.

 User-programmable LEDs (4), buttons (2), and switches (2) are available to easily give input and get output. The nRF9160 DK has both a 4FF SIM card slot and an MFF2 SIM footprint, to support both plug-in and soldered (e)SIMs. It is bundled with an eSIM card from iBasis preloaded with 10 MB.

 Programming and debugging are enabled through the Segger J-Link OB, which also supports external targets. The nRF9160 DK is supported by a full suite of development software and tools, which are all free to download and use commercially.

 nRF Connect SDK includes everything needed to get started: application layer protocols, examples, peripheral drivers, and more. The kit can easily be connected to our cloud solution, nRF Cloud. The nRF Link Monitor tool located in nRF Connect for Desktop provides an AT command interface that enables you to test your link, and extract information about the network.

 The nRF9160 SiP and nRF9160 Development Kit are now in production and are suitable for full end-to-end sensor-to-cloud development.

Summary of Key Features

  • Global LTE-M/NB-IoT antenna
  • GNSS antenna
  • Arduino Uno form factor
  • Supports Bluetooth LE
  • 4 LEDs user-programmable
  • 2 buttons user-programmable
  • 2 switches user-programmable
  • SEGGER J-Link OB Debugger with debug out support
  • UART interface through VCOM port
  • USB connection for debug/programming and power
  • Bundled with an eSIM card from iBasis preloaded with 10 MB

Video

SIM Card and Connecting to Nordic's nRF Cloud

The roadtester will receive an iBasis SIM card. Click here to see its coverage areas.

You will received free 10MB of data.

You will need to register on Nordic's nRF Cloud and activate the SIM card. Click here to go to the instructions.

Additional Information

Important Dates

Enrollment Begins May 8, 2022
Enrollment Closes June 21 2022
RoadTesters Selected June 23 2022
Products Shipped July 7 2022
Roadtesting Begins July 20 2022
element14 Team Follow Up August 20 2022
Publish Reviews by September 20 2022

Terms and Conditions

Click Here to read the Terms and Conditions.

Roadtesters

The following applicants have been selected as official roadtesters:

skruglewicz (deadline Sept 14 2022)

josesnchz (deadline September 15 2022)

Pablosanserr (deadline September 15 2022)

razvis (deadline September 18 2022)

al4475 (deadline Sept 20 2022)

Comment List
Anonymous

  • Hello element14 community.

    I've completed my review and published it. I have only scratched the surface of this evaluation kit by Nordic Semiconductor. I have listed future enhancements that I will be tackling soon.

    I was able to accomplish getting to know the Firmware development environment and eventually get connected to the RF cloud over LTE.  A major accomplishment for me.

    1. I now have 2 tools on my desktop to use to program (Programmer) the DK and to monitor the LTE modem (LTE Link Monitor).
    2. I successfully installed/Updated The Modem firmware (v1.3.1) and the nRF Connect SDK 1.7.0 in the “2021_o6_25_7a076c22” version of the firmware which included Serial LTEmodem, AssetTracker v2, and AT Client.
    3. I successfully updated the DK after many trials of updating the original version and the 2021_o6_25_7a076c22 version.
    4. I successfully created an nRF Cloud account.
      • I was able to Activate and Provision the iBasis SIM card after may attempts over a 48 hour span of time.
      • I was able to finally get on the support SITE DevZone. It also took over 48 hours for me to receive a promised email. I know it must be a process to approve account but when you’re trying to resolve a problem, this time span is a little long.
    5. Once this process was completed, it was smooth sailing. My Device started updating telemetry data to the nRF cloud account and I was able to use the LTE Link Monitor to diagnose the LTE MODEM and send AT commands to the Modem. I was also able to observe that I was connected to the USA T-Mobile Network at 2 bars. Not sure why Verizon was not found?
    6. I was able to test the cellular connection with the “AT Client Sample APP”.

    This is a really well designed evaluation kit. I highly recommend it to prototype the nRF9160 SiP for LTE-M

  • in reply to rscasny

    I was wondering why they are still looking. 

    You can still consider my application if you want. 

    Because I have had tried Airtel SIM card and it works here. Anyways Nordic will have some recommendations for India. 

  • in reply to embeddedguy

    I am looking for one more roadtester. The kit comes with an iBasis SIM card, which doesn't have coverage in some areas. India is one of those areas. If a roadtester were from India, he would have to get a SIM card from a local provider. 

  • in reply to embeddedguy

    I'm working on selecting the last two.

    Randall

  • I am wondering weather there will be two more roadtesters announced? As the Kits offered are five and three roadtesters are announced.

  • I just received the kit via UPS. I'll be starting my review soon.

    Thank you Nordic for selecting me to do this review. I'm synced to start experimenting with it and getting my "Simple Weather Station" up and running.

    Regards

    Steve K

  • in reply to embeddedguy

    No. Since website upgrade, announcement is done by editing description and linking RoadTesters profiles at the end of description. In this case there are still no RoadTesters announced yet. Most probably they are busy with organising contents at this time because lot of competitions were announced, they were busy with shipping prizes and also one competion concluded at this time if I rememeber correctly.

  • Were the road testers announced?

  • in reply to misaz

    I think what you have mentioned is the difference between modules and SoC. In SoC the radio controller and host mcu are on the single chip while the modules are like there is separate MCU sending AT commands to the module. This may be UART interface. 

    I know some of the BLE SoC from Nordic has these interface option where BLE HCI interface example are provided either via UART or it may be something else.

    Don't know how it was in the AVNET Monarch DK..

  • For this Nordic nRF9160 DK evaluation, my idea is to design and Implement a simple Remote Weather Station. The plan would be to utilize the LTE-M/NB-IoT modem on the NRF9160 to communicate to the Cloud. The cloud could be the mentioned nRF Cloud or I would like to send the weather Telemetry data to Azure IoT central. But we shall see.

    I have used LTE-M technology for a review for the AVNET Monarch LTE-M dev kit. The Roadtest page URL is: AVNET Monarch LTE-M Development Kit -- EU.  With this evaluation kit, there were 3 hardware layers and one LTE service provider. I did have troubles with the LTE service, Verizon Thingspace , but I was able to get the Azure IoT central cloud connection to eventually work.

    It would be exciting to review the Nordic nRF9160 DK Kit.

    Steve K