In the video lesson above, we introduce our next series of lessons, which will step you through using Xbee radios to allow your arduino projects to wirelessly communicate with your PC. The good news is that you already know how to communicate between your Arduino and the PC over the serial cable based on our previous lessons. Using Xbee radios is very similar, you just remove the cable. You are still communicating over the serial ports, so the coding remains virtually unchanged . . . you just have to configure and connect the radios. In order to do these lessons, you will need a pair of Series 1 (S1) Xbee Radios (you will need two). If you want longer range, and are willing to pay more, you can get the Seris 1 (S1) Xbee Pro Radios.

To program the radios, you will need a SparkFun USB Explorer.

The final equipment you need will be an Xbee Shield. The shield allows you to plug the Xbee radio into the Arduino.