AZDeliveryRFID Kit - MFRC522 Compatibel with RC522 RF IC Card Reader Sensor Module, RFID Chip Key Ring and S50 Card 13.56MHz I2C IIC SPI, Compatible with Arduino and Raspberry Pi including E-Book!

It seems ages ago now, but it very good has I recall.

I used these with an alarm system, worked great.

Took me a few hours to work out how to read and write data to tags using this and a raspberry pi but I got there in the end and it works really well.However, I was hopeful that it could be used to clone a key fob I already have but the fob and card included don't have changeable UIDs. Most NFC tags have locked UIDs like this I was just hopeful given the nature the device that that wouldn't be the case. Basically it's not a problem with the product but I wanted to make it known to anyone who might be in my shoes

I initially had problems with the boards becoming unresponsive. It turns out it's not the board but the self-test call in the Arduino library!

Works fine, connect and load the libraries and away you go...

Hadn't done anything with RFID since the days of serial ports and Personal Digital Assistants, so had to hope that I would be able to understand what I was doing - also being a relative novice with the Raspberry Pi. Soldering the header on the RFID board was the biggest challenge given my ageing eyesight but I was soon able to both write to and read from the included card and fob.Runs off 3.3V, easily obtainable from the Pi's 40-pin header. There's plenty of libraries and example code online, but I soon discovered that I had to switch from node.js to Python as I was never able to write to the EEPROM section of the card using node.Note that the limitation of range is to some degree down to the particular standard that's used by this board rather than the board itself. The range is better with the card than the fob simply because the aerial is bigger.Photo shows our prototype reader and display (using a Neopixel 24 LED ring) built for conference registration.

Following the link included with the chips took me to all of the relevant documentation for wiring it up to my raspberry pi, which was easy to read and get hooked up.I didn't use their suggested library for interacting with the chip, googling the board name and then python library brought up a vast selection of code to help you get started with this board.Within about 30 minutes I was scanning all of my student ID and reading it through a simple python script on my raspberry pi.Very happy! Just be prepared to do a bit of soldering (it's really easy)Really cool that it comes with programmable chips and cards to work with too, so that you can start prototyping and getting to grips with the chip without damaging any of your actual RFID cards.

Was easy to setup, plenty of tutorials online. Unfortunately I couldnt use it, it doesnt work for rfid chips in pets, or those tags that rfid that surefeed and other petcare suppliers use.It requires close contact to trigger and there doesnt appear to be any way to use a wire antenna so that it can read tags passing through a doorway. I couldnt get it to read at the advertised 3cm range.