Checkout the Circuitcellar competition currently running. (Wiznet) I managed
to get a free sample but they should still be available for a nominal fee.
You need a separate micro however but the TCP/IP or UDP details are handled
by the interface chip.

IIRC the interface is SPI - or possibly optionally SPI / I2C.

Haven't quite had the time to get it hooked up yet but it looks very
promising for this sort of activity.

Richard P


On 06/12/2007, Warren Jackson <wjackson@sas.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
> Hello everybody,
>
> For a hobby project I'm looking for a low cost device that can read small
> amounts of info from the web, and speak I2C.
>
> I'm making something like an Abient Orb [1].  My LED drivers speak I2C.  I
> need to make something that can pull RGB color values from my server, and
> set the RGB LEDs to the desired color via the I2C drivers.
>
> My first impulse was the new(ish) PIC18's that have ethernet.  But they
> are
> only available in TQFP packages (which I don't think I'll be able to
> solder).  I looked for TQFP sockets and they were all about the price of a
> small single board computer.
>
> Does anyone know of a cheap source for TQFP sockets? or a hack solution?
> or
> a ethernet->I2C device in a larger package?  or have a better way to do
> things?
>
> Thanks in advance,
> Warren
>
>
>
>
>
> [1] http://www.ambientdevices.com/cat/orb/orborder.html
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