TL;DR: I can’t connect the external antenna to the board Wi-Fi connector, just wanted to know if there is anything I should know or that I’m missing.
Hello, I’m new to the BPI (and boards in general, Raspberry Pi, etc…), and this is my first time dealing with this type of hardware.
Everything just got here today, I wanted to try to figure it out my self, but there are no videos showing an example or any ‘marks’ on the board showing the right way of plugging it in.
I’m guessing that you just need to do it, no special requirements, but since I didn’t find any evidence on it, I would like to ask someone that knows exactly what they are doing, how exactly do I connect the external antenna to the board Wi-Fi connector?
The connectors are all ufl. Putting them on is generally pretty ‘easy’ (although fiddly). You just want the floating connector to be squarely aligned with the PCB, and then just firmly push down. It will clip into place.
Removing them properly is trickier. There is actually a special tool for it to ensure that you don’t deform the connectors. However, I’m sure almost all of us just use the cable, and apply some tilting force to the connectors, that will pop off the connector (it does tend to deform the connectors over time also… but if you only do it a small number of times it’s probably pretty harmless)
Thanks, since it’s already quite late, and I do have an AP (some form of wireless) I will be trying again tomorrow and will be updating this post to reflect on the results.
@bevanweiss & @ericwoud Thank You it worked now, following both advices I took a flat head (with only fingers it was too hard), and it was flawless.
Now I have one more question, all the antennas seems to be quite loose, should I be able to tighten the nut that was already attached to the connector? I turned it on just for a test, works fine, but not sure how to proceed, they seem to be fragile to be messing around too much.
edit: pretty sure that if I buy some nuts to screw in the antenna connector this problem is solved, I’m going to look into this better.
it worked now, following both advices I took a flat head (with only fingers it was too hard), and it was flawless.
Now I have one more question, all the antennas seems to be quite loose, should I be able to tighten the nut that was already attached to the connector? I turned it on just for a test, works fine, but not sure how to proceed, they seem to be fragile to be messing around too much.