Seeed Studio’s reCamera AI camera is a modular RISC-V smart camera system for edge AI applications based on SOPHGO SG2002 SoC. The camera is made up of three boards: the Core board, the Sensor board, and the Baseboard. The Core board includes hosts the processor, storage, and optional Wi-Fi. The Sensor board consists of image choice of image sensors, and the Baseboard provides various connectivity options including USB Type-C, UART, microSD, and optional PoE port and CAN bus connectivity options. At the time of writing the company has released the C1_2002w and C1_2002 core boards. The C1_2002w core board includes eMMC storage, Wi-Fi, and BLE modules, and the C1_2002 features extra SDIO and UART connectivity, but not WiFi. Both boards use the SOPHGO SG2002 tri-core processor and can be paired with various camera sensors for applications such as robotics, healthcare, smart home, as well as buildings and industrial automation. […]
Raspberry Pi Pico Arduino core 4.0 adds support for RP2350 boards
Earle F. Philhower, III has just released the Raspberry Pi Pico Arduino core 4.0 with support for a range of Raspberry Pi RP2350 boards beside the official Raspberry Pi Pico 2. Shortly after the RP2040-based Raspberry Pi Pico board was released, we got two Arduino SDKs, the first being the community-supported Raspberry Pi Pico Arduino core maintained by Earle, and the second being the official Arduino Core Mbed 2.0 for boards as such as Arduino Nano Connect RP2040. We are again likely to have two Arduino SDKs for the RP2350 starting with the Raspberry Pi Pico Arduino core. Key changes in Raspberry Pi Pico Arduino core 4.0: Adds Raspberry Pi RP2350 support (Arm only; RISC-V cores are not supported at this stage) Migrates to Pico SDK 2.0 since it is required for RP2350 support and includes a new OpenOCD and Picotool. Tested features: SPI, I2C, LittleFS, EEPROM, PWMAudio, LWIP-based networking, […]
Comparison of Raspberry Pi 5 with 2GB and 8GB RAM – Hardware, benchmarks, and power consumption
The Raspberry Pi 5 with 2GB RAM was launched last week, and since I got a sample for review, I decided to compare it to the Raspberry Pi 5 with 8GB RAM to see if I could find any noticeable differences between the two boards. I’ll start with a visual inspection to show differences on the PCBA, then check system information, run some benchmarks, check power consumption, and finally try to open as many tabs in Firefox until the 2GB RAM is filled and the system becomes unusable. Raspberry Pi 5 2GB vs Raspberry Pi 8GB – visual inspection We should first have a quick look at the boards and packages there’s no obvious difference apart from seeing 2GB RAM and 8GB RAM on the respective packages. But if we look closer, we can see the resistors for memory capacity detection are in different locations for “2G” and “8G”, and […]
Integrated motor driver and controller bundles ESP32-S3 and TMC2209 for IoT applications
The PD Stepper is a NEMA 17 integrated stepper motor driver and controller board powered by USB power delivery that combines an ESP32-S3 wireless microcontroller, the Trinamic TMC2209 ultra-silent motor driver, and other components onto a single board for Smart Home and automation applications. The maker, Josh R., states that the PD Stepper isn’t another “just because we can” project. It addresses the need for an integrated motor driver and controller module that can used in compact or space-constrained designs. The ESP32-S3 SoC controls the other components on the board and provides wireless connectivity as well as access to development tools and libraries such as ESPHome and ESP-Now. The motor driver IC, Analog Devices’s Trinamic TMC2209, offers efficient, noiseless control of two-phase stepper motors. Other onboard components and connectors include an AS5600 magnetic rotary position sensor, a 3.3V buck converter, a Qwiic/Stemma QT connector, a motor connector, and an AUX […]
Nuvoton NuMicro MA35D1-powered industrial SoM and dev board features dual GbE ports, cellular connectivity, and more
MYIR has recently introduced MYC-LMA35 industrial SoM and its associated development board built around the Nuvoton NuMicro MA35D1 microprocessor with two Arm Cortex-A35 cores and one Arm Cortex-M4 real-time core for processing. The SoM comes in a BGA package with connectivity options such as dual Gigabit Ethernet, cellular connectivity, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth, and various other interfaces like RS232, RS485, USB, CAN, ADC, GPIO, and more. All these features make this SoM and its associated dev board useful for demanding edge IIoT applications like industrial automation, energy management systems, smart city infrastructure, and remote monitoring solutions. Previously we have seen MYIR introduce various SoM and development boards like the MYC-LR3568 Edge AI SoM, and the MYC-YF13X SoM and we have also written about similar industrial dev boards such as the Firefly ROC-RK3576-PC, the Nuvoton NuMicro M2L31 development board, and many more. Feel free to check those out if you are interested in the topic. […]
Review of Napcat wireless NVR with solar-powered security cameras
After I reviewed the NapCat smart video doorbell last June, the company asked me to review a wireless NVR with solar-powered security cameras and I understood I would receive a kit with four solar-powered cameras and an NVR with storage preinstalled. In this review, I’ll go through an unboxing, a quick teardown of the NVR, the installation process, and my experience with the Napcat NVR user interfaces (connected to HDMI) and the Napcat Life Android app which I also used with the video doorbell. Napcat wireless NVR N1S22 kit unboxing The package I’ve received reads “N1S22” model of a “Solar-powered Security Camera System” and is quite smaller than I expected. One reason for the small size is that my kit only comes with two cameras instead of four, and the company also did a good job of making everything take as little space as possible. On the net, you’ll see […]
ESP8266-powered Netgotchi network security scanner aims to protect your home network
The Netgotchi network security scanner is a simple, compact device based on an ESP8266 wireless microcontroller with a single goal: to defend your home network from intruders and potential bad actors. It is described as “Pwnagotchi’s older brother,” a network guardian that keeps your network safe instead of penetrating it. If you are unfamiliar with Pwnagotchi, it is an A2C-based (advantage actor-critic) “AI” that can penetrate Wi-Fi networks using WPA key material obtained from passive sniffing or de-authentication attacks. The Netgotchi is a reverse Pwnagotchi that alerts you to intruders or breaches in your network. It runs on a simple microcontroller and cannot employ reinforcement learning like the Pwnagotchi. Rather, it pings the network periodically and reports any new potential security threats. The device’s design is as simple as its purpose. It is an ESP8266 microcontroller connected to an OLED display and running an Arduino .ino script, enclosed in a […]
Arduino Core for ESP32 gets a Zigbee wrapper library
Some of the newer Espressif Systems wireless SoCs such as the ESP32-H2 and ESP32-C6 support Zigbee through their built-in 802.15.4 radio. It’s been working since the release of the ESP-IDF 5.1 framework along with the ESP-Zigbee-SDK for a while, but Arduino support was less straightforward. But this is about to change as an Espressif engineer nicknamed P-R-O-C-H-Y has recently added a Zigbee wrapper library for the ESP-Zigbee-SDK to Arduino Core for ESP32 that works with ESP32-C6 and ESP32-H2 as standalone nodes and other SoC can be used as radio co-processor attached to an RPC (802.15.4 radio layer). The wrapper library currently supports the following: Zigbee classes and all Zigbee roles Zigbee network scanning Allow multiple endpoints on the same Zigbee device (not tested yet) Supported Home Assistant devices On/off light + switch Color Dimmable light + switch Setting Manufacturer and model name Other tasks currently planned include supporting “Temperature sensor […]