What this is is a slightly modified Fonekit 2500 mAh single 18650 powerbank that I found at my local big-box electronics store in the clearance bin, mated to a Digital Logic uFR Nano Online.
By sheer luck, the powerbank and the reader have the exact same width, and almost the same length. It’s like they were made for each other. I cracked open the power bank, added an ON/OFF switch, removed the regular USB-A socket and soldered the end of a micro-USB cable that I stripped bare and bent the soldered leads of 90 degrees, as close to the go-go end of the plug as possible.
I mounted the reader onto the powerbank at the right location, plugged the micro-USB plug, then potted everything in hot melt:
You can disable the green flashing LED by running the command GreenLedBlinkingTurnOff.
You can find more information about this function on page 321 of our API document.
We are currently developing a new Wireless NFC reader with built-in battery support.
New features include: one PCB board instead of two, larger NFC antenna, added ISO15693 support, battery support.
We have to make one more hardware revision before the device can be officially released.
Once it’s ready, we’ll send you a complimentary device so you can continue making wonderful (dangerous) things with our products.
Hi DigitalLogic. You joined the forum, that’s really cool!
Yeah but that doesn’t work in Master mode. It should be a config option in Master mode (disable the blinking when no card is in the field, but still make it flash when it reads something I guess).
I’m very, very interesting in that one too. Indeed I’m very keen to do some testing if you’d like.
Yeah, it is pretty useful looking… Lucky you have skinny fingers…There are some people here that are a little more Chunky.
I wonder if it would work as easily
Probably. The uFR Nano reads it through my finger with a pretty substantial air gap between the reader and my finger - like a quarter inch or something. You’d have to have massive paws for it not to read. And you can always remove the sticker on top of the reader for a bit of extra range if you’re a bit short: the sticker is like 1 mm thick or more.
Range-wise, it’s night and day. Of course it ain’t no Proxmark in that it’s a regular NFC reader. Not much hacking going on with it. It can do a lot, but only a lot of regular operations.
LF or HF, the Proxmark is pretty crap at coupling. Or let’s say average to be charitable. It’s great, but in that respect it disappoints.
Our development was slightly postponed because of other higher-priority projects.
We resumed the wireless device project last month and we are giving it a priority this time.
We analyzed the market and the available wireless solutions, and as a result, we decided to change the Wi-Fi/BLE IC we were initially going to use, for a module with an integrated antenna that is offering better performance.
We are also using this opportunity to integrate the latest available NFC microcontroller into our product.
We expect to have the first prototype ready in about two-three months, and the final device to be released by the end of the year.
