Communicating between two XBee 2.5’s quick instructions:

– XBee is very versatile radio modem which works trough serial connection. It’s really simple when you get it working; everything you send to the XBee Serial port is coming out of other XBee serial port. That’s it. And it works on 2.4 gig frequency. It’s very very the same as old modems that were used trough telephones. Here, just replace the telephone line with built-in 2.4 GHz support.
– However you have to configure the 2.5 version first to get things right. It doesn’t work out of the box!
– You *NEED* to use the X-CTU and configure other as ZNET 2.5 COORDINATOR AT (“master”)and the other as ZNET 2.5 ROUTER/END DEVICE AT (node).
– Make sure XBee answers to +++ command. If it doesn’t work your communication is not working, probably your COM speed is incorrect.
– You *MUST* dial from the master to node with the ATDN command. Otherwise it’s in broadcast mode and it’s unreliable. However the communcation works in broadcast but in broadcast you might also loose the connection quite easily. If the master is rebooted it might not connect automatically to node in broadcast.
– PAN ID is your network ID, this must be the same between all devices that communicate together
– Arduino Fio cannot be programmed when XBee is connected (same Serial line)
– You can use the SparkFun XBee shield together with FTDI adapter to program the XBee with X-CTU. Just connect Serial (3.3V level!!) and VCC (3.3!!) and GND. XBee doesn’t need anything else. Of course disconnect the Arduino board from the shield so that you don’t connect the two serial lines together :)

These instructions really helped me: http://t413.com/news/fast-2-way-xbee-series-2-data

Thanks to SparkFun again for great products and support.

Some links:

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=9588
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=8691