36: Early Experiences with the Particle Electron
-- Revised 4/16/2016 --

See https://docs.particle.io/guide/getting-started/intro/electron/ for a full description. But, briefly, the Electron communicates with the cloud via cell service instead of wifi & your Internet connection. Also, it's costs more than the $19 Photon ($80 for the developer setup). In addition, you need to have cell service -- starting at $2.99/mo (initial 1MB).

I hadn't bought in to the Kickstarter campaign so I waited a while for my first unit. See post 32. In a single day I managed to break it twice: first I mangled the tiny brass antenna socket (but I repaired it with the help of a strong magnifying glass). Next, I broke the USB plug off the board -- I was moving the Electron around trying to get it to connect to cell service & pulled too hard on the cord (Warning: not very hard). BTW: Particle did not give me a replacement.

Irksome. But I thought I still needed the cell-connection feature. So I ordered another one. Quick delivery. I'd learned a couple lessons (you can, too): I was patient and got the antenna connected at the cost of only 15 minutes of teeth-gnashing. Then I taped the whole setup to a board and used a USB extension cord so I never have to plug/unplug directly to the Electron's socket.

Programming is nearly the same as the Photon (there are some Electron-only cell service functions). But here's a few differences: I have pretty reliable AT&T cell service (2 or 3 of 5 bars on my phone). But while a Photon connects to my wifi in a couple seconds the Electron can take 1 to 5 minutes (thats what led me to break my unit #1). Also, it appears to me that orientation of the provided antenna matters. When the antenna is lying flat (edge on to the signal) connection is less reliable than if the upright (flat on to the signal). I've written a C++ program to test this & I'll post the results.

REVISION/ADDITION
I haven't had a lot of joy with the Electron. The place I was going to install a few appears to have good FreedomPop cell modem service. Current price is: Modem $0, 1 GB LTE data/month $15. Particle Photons are $19 (plus cell modem), Electrons $69.

My test program was no fun. I wasted most of my month's data just trying to download versions of the code (download often failed but data was used, anyway). Downloading via USB seldom worked.

Also: I sometimes get the blinking red light "hard fault" signal. Hard fault is not explained. Lately I've had a LED signal not described in the online Docs. The usual sequence when you power up a Particle device is--

1. blinking green (looking for signal)
2. blinking blue (signal found, working on logging in, etc. -- this reminds me of dogs sniffing each other's butts)
3. breathing cyan (you are in!)

-- but in my case it's solid cyan (not useable).