Hardware alternatives - share your experiences

[tkurki]

Reposting a post by @YvesPirson that got deleted. I rewrote the title.

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Recently, I became interested in Signal K. I read all the online documentation, followed tutorials and other presentations on specialized websites and even on YouTube, and I was seduced.

I had some equipment, a small PC, and a BananaPi that I hoped would be suitable.

I started by installing Debian on the PC and then followed the explanations to start the program. Unfortunately, in PC mode, several options are lost and, it must be said, despite all the information given, a lot of time is needed to stabilize and make the program work.

So, I turned to my BananaPi, which seemed closer to the recommended product on all pages, the RaspberryPI.

Let me tell you right away that despite several days of testing and research, I did not achieve a better result with my BananaPI than with my PC.

So, I looked into acquiring a RaspberryPI 3 or 4, which seemed to be the best option.

As it is announced everywhere on your pages at a price of $50,- more or less, I can make this purchase to gain all the options and, above all, the ease of implementing Signal K.

I went to the manufacturer's website to find the list of resellers. I found the Raspberry 4B - 2 Gb model advertised at €59.99, but it is out of stock. Let's move on to a larger model, the Raspberry 4 - 4 Gb, which is offered at €74.23, which is already more expensive... but it is also not available.

Well, I'll go check on Amazon. There I should find what I need. I was shocked when I saw the prices on this site for these products... €240,- for the 4 Gb version and €195,- for the 2 Gb version in stock. I searched on other sites. Aliexpress (which, incidentally, has nothing "express" about it!!!) offers the 4 Gb for €261.47 and the 2 Gb for €207.23.

I am dismayed. Discouraged. I will forget about Signal K because going from the originally announced $50.- to well over € 200,-, I cannot afford the project.

But couldn't we, given these price increases, try to set up tutorials more adapted to secondary platforms such as BabanaPI or other xxxPI that are available at much more affordable prices?

I am not competent enough to find the solutions that would allow a stable version of Signal K to be installed on one of these products.

But, and this is the objective of my POST, can't we find people who have succeeded and who could clearly present their solutions as is done today for the RPI?

Thank you for reading my text so far. I hope the translation was able to convey my idea and especially that it will suit several people who are blocked like me by a hardware budget that has exploded.

[tkurki]

The prices you quote sound steep indeed, and availability seems to be still scarce. There's https://rpilocator.com/ - 3A seems to be available in some outlets right now, for <40€.

But you are not limited to RPi in any way. SK Server runs on any platform where you can run a recent version of Node.js. Setup instructions for Raspberry Pi should work as is or with little adaptation for any Linux. There's a dedicated Windows setup and with a tiny bit of googling you can find post about Signal K on Mac OS. The community in Slack and here can help if you get stuck.

So there are plenty of alternatives, SK is in no way just RPis, jus that earlier their prices, availability and community made it a good choice.

@mgrouch has been promoting alternative hardware platforms in Facebook, maybe you could share your best tips here?

But in all honesty I have a hard time seeing how going above $50 is a showstopper in boating.

[YvesPirson]

I was a bit disappointed with my first approaches to Signalk.
Indeed the solution on PC / Debian Linux then on BananaPI / ARMBian Linux did not satisfy me.
While looking for support for these environments I found an option that appealed to me immediately.
This is an installation of Debian (you can choose other distributions) directly in Windows 10.
Indeed it is possible to add a feature to Windows to allow a Linux distribution to be installed in Windows without having to go through a virtual machine or other trick of this kind.
This option is called WSL2 (Windows System for Linux). There are a lot of sites and tutorials but it's so easy to install that I didn't have to look very far.
My idea was to install linux in this WSL and install Signalk server in this environment. It worked well, easy to install and very stable. But my skills to connect accessories from Linux to USB connections held me back and I was left without a solution at this level.
While looking for information to finalize the installation of Signalk in WSL2 I arrived on even better...
I found complete solution from Signalk in windows directly without linux platform under it. And the best part is that it's an executable that performs all the installation of all the modules in just ONE operation.
So I uninstall the WSL2 which I really liked and I downloaded the installer and I launched it, not very sure of the result but I wanted to try.
Very nice surprise... we didn't have to intervene, everything went smoothly.

Here is what's provide with this installer

• The latest version of the Signal K server downloaded during installation.
• NodeJS 16.13.2 ( downloaded from https://nodejs.org/dist/v16.13.2/ during installation).
  If your current OS version is lower than Windows 10, NodeJS 12 only will be install (https://nodejs.org/download/release/v12.22.9/)
• openssl 1.1.1h (from https://slproweb.com/products/Win32OpenSSL.html).
• support of X64 and X86 Windows version (Windows 10 X64 and Windows 7 X86 tested).
• All packages are installed under a root directory. You choose your root directory at the time of installation.
• Signal K can start as windows service if you choose it at the time of installation.
• You can re-run the installer several times.
• HTML installation help built with https://github.com/nea/MarkdownViewerPlusPlus

Here is the link where you can find the installation program and the necessary explanations for its installation:

https://github.com/SignalK/signalk-server-windows

Here is a solution that works the first time, which does not require knowledge of less common OS than Windows and which is stable.

I immediately created a connection to my Arduino Mega 2560 which reads the CAN bus with a common CAN BUS Shield. (ask me for details if you want to create such a gateway)

At first I generated the NMEA 2000 signals with another Arduino ESP32 to simulate the information available on a boat.

When everything was operational, I connected a Raymarine RS 150 GPS Receiver which sends the signals on the STNG network (SeaTalk ng) and bingo I immediately received the expected PGNs in Signalk.

I then configured OpenCPN on my PC and connected it to Signalk. Everything is operational without any stress.

I look forward to returning to the boat at the end of May to finalize the installation and view the NMEA 2000 network data in the various SignalK Web Apps already pre-installed in the solution.

I hope that this small presentation of this installation will help others to finalize a powerful installation in the best prices.

See you soon,

Yves (enchanted with Signalk in Windows 10)