PineBerry Pi was the first company to launch a Raspberry Pi HAT+ board making use of the Raspberry Pi 5’s PCIe FPC connector with the Hatdrive! M.2 HAT for the Raspberry Pi 5 along with the HatDrive! Bottom expansion board that goes underneath the Raspberry Pi 5 SBC.
The company has now launched five additional HAT+ boards for the Raspberry Pi 5 with various PCIe (NVMe/AI modules) and networking (2.5GbE, GbE) options.
Here’s the list with basic specifications:
- HatNET! 2.5G – 2.5GbE for the Raspberry Pi 5 using a Realtek RTL8125BG controller, dedicated MAC address range (i.e. not randomly assigned), and an RJ45 jack with Activity and Link LEDs
- HatDrive! NET 1G – Gigabit Ethernet (Realtek RTL8111H) and M.2 M-Key socket for NVMe 2230,2242 SSD. Implemented through an ASMedia PCIe Gen 2 switch and booting with the SSD is not supported at this time. You may want to follow the relevant GitHub issue if that’s important to you.
- HatDrive! AI – Two M.2 PCIe sockets: one M-Key socket for a 2230/2242 NVMe SSD and one E-Key socket for a Google Coral Edge TPU module or other compatible M.2 module. Implemented through an ASMedia PCIe Switch with the same limitation as above.
- HatDrive! Dual – Same as above but with two M.2 M-Key PCIe sockets for 2230/2242 NVMe SSDs. RAID-1 is supported for data redundancy.
- HatBRICK! Commander – Adds two PCIe FPC connectors to the Raspberry Pi 5 through an ASMedia PCIe switch to daisy chain as many PCIe HAT+ boards as needed. A 5V DC input connector is also included if additional power is required
Besides the five new boards, PineBerry Pi also changed the design of the original HatDrive! TM1 HAT+ with the new HatDrive! TM1S HAT+ adding one opening to provide easier access to the MIPI CSI/DSI connectors and a custom CNC-milled metal bracket for easier SSD installation.
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All the PineBerry Pi HAT+ boards ship with an FPC PCIe ribbon cable and relevant accessories. You’ll find them on the company’s online store for €16,99 to €45,99 depending on the selected model. Some of the new boards are for pre-order so they’ll only start shipping around March 20. There might be a benefit in terms of compactness when using HAT+ boards, but there’s also a price premium, most notably for the HatNET! 2.5G (45.99 Euros) since you can find RTL8156BG USB 3.0 dongles with the same performance going for $20 and up on Amazon.
Via Twitter/X
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Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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