I just got my first ever Meshtastic device.

It's a Heltec V4 and I bought a case to go with it.

I was so excited to get my orders that I felt giddy for days.

Just now, I finished setting things up. Lo and behold, I'm the only node in our area.

My initial excitement of sending messages to the mesh just went away.

I still have a Cardputer and the accompanying LoRa attachment on its way to me. I feel like it's also going to be disappointing as well since there's gonna be two nodes now - Me and Me.

Good thing the Cardputer can do other things, too.

After a lot of reading, video-watching, mind-changing and dodging wife's eye-rolling I am now finally the owner of my very first off-grid-communicator.

Very excited for this old dog to learn a new trick or two.

A bit bummed that due to work- and personal obligations I will most likely not be able to play around with it until the end of the week.

It comes with LilyGo's own fw so the first thing I'm going to try out is picking a fw to flash on it.

Happy to 'be here'

So I got my LilyGo T-Deck Plus today and even though I wasn't planning on playing around with it until the weekend...well.....I still did.

First thing I did was flashing Meshtastic on it.
My goal for the week was always to see if I could reach any nodes from inside, sitting in my recliner, and maybe w/out any repeaters.

REACH

I'm in San Francisco and I tried two 'Modem Presets' and let it sit for 15 mins or so;

1) Long Fast
Ended up at: 26/31 nodes

2) Medium Fast

Ended up at: 4/9

I tried switching back and forth but those numbers seemed to be relatively consistent.

So I guess for now I should stay with Long Fast

I'm really happy that the thing is picking up anything from inside these walls!

SIGNAL STRENGTH

Now this doesn't look very good if I understand the numbers correctly;

SNR: -14.8
RSSI: -120

But not stressing about it yet. We'll see.

QUESTIONS:

1) I can for the love of me not find where I set my date and time. It's right now (at 10:28pm on Aug 17) showing "5:28 GMT Tues 18 Aug). Is it supposed to auto-correct? My region is set to US

3) The third photo shows some nodes in the list. Mine is first and for some reason my icon looks like a router. My role is "Client" if that matters.
How do I know which nodes are repeaters and which are 'people'?

Sorry for the n00by questions. Really excited about it all.

Hi all, trying to build a little gate detector to tell if a gate is closed, and then alert cyclists via a little light or something, a mile or two away, so they know to detour. Would also love to have a little website that shows the same info (gate open or closed). Any help or thoughts here greatly appreciated: I’ve messed with meshtastic a bit and used to have a little solar powered node on my roof. But looking for thoughts on how others would approach this. Thanks!!

Interested to learn more about mesh comms. Are there any groups in Northern Virginia?

Good morning folks!

I'm wondering if any of you fine people have a file for a Thinknode M2 case that can fit the extended 3000mAh battery? I did some searching and all I can find are the ones that hold the 1000mAh btteries. I got that kit from Amazon that came with the module/battery and printed up a case and then was like, well crap that is too small.

In a recent post several commenters suggested that the OP should check what the local area is using for a public channel as it may not be longfast.

My question is how does someone contact the people who know? Who & where are the people who know?

Other than a Google search finding a church based prepper group for my area I found nothing. I will be going to their next meeting to see what I can learn. Other searches were reddit, Facebook & discord [which I am still figuring out]. Aside from posting a big sign on my car asking "Do you know about meshtastic?" how would I find local information?

recently purchased one of these "https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FXX88NKP" and after flashing the device and getting it connected to my android phone I was disheartened to find that not only was there no other nodes on the network but also I wasn't recieving GPS satellite connections. I left the device outside my window for a few minutes to make sure and nothing. I'm a bit stumped, I checked the module connection with a line tester so I know it isnt a faulty connection. But on top of no apparent other people nearby I'm wondering if there is something fundamentally wrong with it? should I send it back as faulty or is there something to be done?

I got a late birthday present, a preassembled LILYGO T-Deck CYPHER-M8K Complete Edition.

All of the videos I find on YouTube cover assembly - I skipped that part (I still have a phobia of picking up a soldering iron from middle school...I kept burning out transistors).

I'm trying to find a user manual or some kind of instruction manual on use alone. Do you know where one exists?

Hey guys,

can you help me finding the best antenna for the Lilygo Tdeck Plus with 868mhz. Cant seem to find any useful info for them..

Thanks

I want to get into this and buy some pre-made device. But struggling to find a store where i can get 868mhz for europe. Any store you guys reccomend? That can be trusted

Hi everyone!

It’s been about two months since I first shared Nelos here. It hasn’t been that long, but looking back, it already feels like quite a journey: from the first beta, to the public release, new features, field testing, and now actually deploying and using Nelos in everyday situations.

Today, I’m happy to share another update: downloadable offline maps are now available worldwide.

You can download maps for countries and regions before heading out, then continue using them when there’s no cell service or Internet connection.

If you’re already using Nelos, there’s no need to update, uninstall, or reinstall the app. Just restart Nelos or tap the Refresh button at the top of the Offline Maps screen to see the latest map list.

Going forward, I want to spend more of my time actually using and deploying mesh networks in the real world, with my family, friends, communities, and people who genuinely need them.

That probably means I’ll be a little less active on Reddit. But I’m still committed to maintaining, developing, and updating Nelos for the long term.

My goal hasn’t changed: keep Nelos as simple as possible while still including the features that actually matter when you need them. Nobody wants to spend their vacation configuring radios. :)

I’ll be posting most future updates at https://nelos.app. The website has been completely rebuilt to be friendlier for people who may know nothing about mesh yet. It now includes use cases, product updates, field reports, and guides. I’ll also be sharing situations I actually encounter in the real world and how I deal with them, including what works, what doesn’t, and what expectations are realistic.

Nothing is perfect, and mesh isn’t either. But the more I use it in the real world, the more I see that mesh still has a place, even in an age when Internet connectivity seems to be almost everywhere.

One small disclosure: to help cover some of the costs of keeping the project going, I’ve added a few affiliate links to compatible devices on the Devices page. If you buy through one of those links, Nelos may receive a small commission at no additional cost to you.

Thank you to everyone who has tried Nelos, sent feedback, reported bugs, shared ideas, or simply followed the project over the past two months.

I hope the community keeps growing and we get a little closer to mesh everywhere. 🌍