New user with loads of questions

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Hello all!

My first hello was technically in the thread below as I wanted to share my experience with shipping of the exact board — if you were like me reading many posts here on Meshtastic, just do it and buy the board! :
TTGO is now selling TBEAMs with Meshtastic preinstalled

Having owned GoTenna products, I have to say with my minimal playtime (a few hours last night) with Meshtastic and the noted board, this is perfectly what I want; Something to tinker with (more on this in a bit), something cheap enough to give away to grow the connections in my neighbour (I am the only node in ~25kms), to use for backpacking in groups (but travelling at different speeds — think WCT, PCT, Appalachian trail) and when the pandemic is “over”, out at sea on a cruise and port days =)

In short, the GoTenna product is not cheap and they have gone “pro” — I was looking for something to carry extras to just give to people to use who I want in my mesh network — Go Meshtastic!

Alright, here comes the onslaught of questions:

  1. Battery life: Using the “default” settings, what is the expected power drain of the unit with GPS and BLE?
    Also from AliExpress I bought (without much thought) the first 18650 battery link that popped up — a green Fijila 18650 19800mAh <— well I am guessing that 19800mAh is not true because, after 1.5 hours of playing and leaving it the unit powered on while I slept, the board reports the battery life to be about 40% after a standby of 9 hours. I have read other users getting … days?

  2. Is there a link to all the parameters I can play with the Meshtastic API? I gather there are many things I can send in with the --setstr (?).
    For example, changing the sleep/standby mode (seems to be more “present” on one board compare to the other hah ha) or a way to reset back to default? Or connecting to Wi-Fi and then setting this unit as the router?

  3. In either a terminal or Meshtastic API, how can I read messages and then reply?
    I can sendtext and it works great (my wife isnt going to want to play “can you see this message” all night, so I will just script something to send from one unit while I go for a walk) but I was curious with the how to use the reply or rather, read?

  4. What might be the reasons that I do not see “People” when I join nodes to the same channel? I have noticed if I cannot see the other people from my other node, I will not receive messages on my phone from that person (device); But if that other person/device node can see “me” and has “me” listed in their “People” (I.e. they can see themselves and me) they can see my messages.
    I do not think it is a phone issue, because I can swap the phone as the device/person connecting to the nodes and the symptom does not follow the person/device, it follows the node.

  5. How do I reset the channel to “default” or maybe another way of asking this question is: What should I do to be open to receive any message from any fellow Meshtastic?
    I will want to drive by the one node I see on the Node Map (awesome by the way) and send a hello to the follow mesher as it is marked as a stationary device.

Alright, I think those fives questions will keep me busy in my exploration of Meshtastic!!
I hope my thread will be searchable for other new users as I could not find updated information on most of what I am asking but maybe my search powers are not strong from within; sorry in advance if this is to be the proven case!

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Hello and welcome

I can try answer some of you questions, I’m new to this myself if other answer they may know better than me :wink:

  1. Battery life depends of many variables. The power information is listed in the:
    Meshtastic-device/power.md at master · meshtastic/Meshtastic-device · GitHub

In router mode i get ca 3 days with a 2000mah battery with almost no human messages

  1. In python api you can use “meshtastic -h” to see arguments
    GitHub - meshtastic/Meshtastic-python: The Python API for talking to Meshtastic devices

  2. A easy way to see packets without sending messages are in the debug panel in the app. You can see snr of the communication and node info. Its “always” some background communication going on.

Christian

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Hi Christian!
Thank you for the hello =)

I appreciate the data about 3 days in router mode with a 2000mAh battery, that helps me confirm the batteries I bought are far from anything it claims to be hah ha.

Yes, I will have to settle for the debug in a terminal window, it serves its purpose to show the message was received with the date/time stamp - nothing wrong with a few terminal windows open, it does the job.

I meant to update my post indicating all the goodies with parameters to set can be seen in the main — and very clearly with the whats =)

What is the smallest size LoRa board (wihtout a battery holder or with) out there with and without GPS?

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Today’s supported hardware and you never know what’s supported tomorrow :wink:
GitHub - meshtastic/Meshtastic-device: Device code for the Meshtastic ski/hike/fly/customizable open GPS radio

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Also you should update the firmware from the default shipped by ttgo. The 1.0 release was solid but the battery usage was much higher.

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Thanks @christianl with the newer board on the way, I might hang on from ordering just for a bit.

@geeksville you bet! The first thing I did when I got the board was to update the firmware — the latest 1.1.34 got on to both boards I think, on Thursday when it was released? The Bluetooth firmware update works quite well, only failed once but I believe it was because I was consistently toggled out to other applications on the phone.

I have been having a lot of fun playing around with the gadgets. Had a stranger ask me about the antenna sticking out of my bag while at the park with my children … handed him a disinfectant wet wipe and the board in the shipped plastic box to look over :stuck_out_tongue: I hope he joins the community so we have another node in place to goof around with!

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