Bee Motion S3 – An ESP32-S3 board with a PIR motion sensor (Crowdfunding)

ESP32 S3 board PIR Motion Sensor

The Bee Motion S3 is an ESP32-S3 WiFi and Bluetooth IoT board with a PIR motion sensor beside the more usual I/Os, Qwiic connector, USB-C port, and LiPo battery support. It is at least the third PIR motion wireless board from Smart Bee Designs, as the company previously introduced the ESP32-S2 powered Bee Motion board and the ultra-small Bee Motion Mini with an ESP32-C3 SoC. The new Bee Motion S3 adds a few more I/Os, a light sensor, and the ESP32-S3’s AI vector extensions could potentially be used for faster and/or lower-power TinyML processing. Bee Motion S3 specifications: Wireless module – Espressif Systems ESP32-S3-MINI-1 module (PDF datasheet) based on ESP32-S3 dual-core Xtensa LX7 microcontroller with 512KB SRAM, 384KB ROM, WiFi 4 and Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity, and equipped with 8MB of QSPI flash and a PCB antenna USB – 1x USB Type-C port for power and programming Sensors PIR sensor S16-L221D […]

Gowin R86S mini PC offers 2.5GbE and 10GbE networking for $310 and up

Gowin R86S

Gowin R86S (aka GW-R86S) is an affordable Intel Celeron N5100 or Pentium N6005 Jasper Lake mini PC, router, and firewall appliance with 2.5GbE and 10GbE networking that sells for $310 and up on Aliexpress. 10GbE used to be reserved for the enterprise market due to the cost of hardware, but costs have gone down a lot as illustrated by the Gowin R86S system with up to three 2.5GbE ports, two 10GbE SFP+ cages, as well as ports that you would typically find a mini PC such as HDMI 2.0 video output, M.2 socket for NVMe SSD, two USB 3.0 ports, and a WiFi module. Gowin R86S specifications: SoC (one or the other) Intel Celeron N5105 quad-core Jasper Lake processor @ 2.0GHz / 2.9GHz (Turbo) with Intel UHD graphics 605; 10W TDP Intel Pentium N6005 quad-core Jasper Lake processor @ 2.0GHz / 3.3GHz (Turbo) with Intel UHD graphics @ up to […]

Add an ePaper display to Raspberry Pi Pico W with EnkPi 2.9-inch to 7.5-inch displays (Crowdfunding)

EnkPi Raspberry Pi Pico W ePaper Display

SB Components is running another crowdfunding campaign with the EnkPi ePaper display powered by a Raspberry Pi Pico W board and offered in four different sizes namely 2.9-inch, 4.2-inch 5.83-inch, and 7.5-inch. Each mainboard also comes with a USB Type-C port, a microSD card socket, an RTC with a backup battery holder, a buzzer, six user buttons, and a JST connector for expansion with GPIO, I2C, UART, and ADC signals. EnkPi specifications: MCU board – Raspberry Pi Pico W with Raspberry Pi RP2040 dual-core Cortex-M0+ microcontroller, 2MB QSPI flash, WiFi 4 module. Storage – MicroSD card socket Display connected over SPI to the Pico W board 2.9-inch tricolor ePaper display with 296×128 resolution 4.2-inch tricolor ePaper display with 400×300 resolution 5.83-inch tricolor ePaper display with 648×480 resolution 7.5-inch tricolor ePaper display with 800×480 resolution Partial refresh support with up to 170 degrees wide viewing angle USB – 1x USB Type-C […]

$200 Swarm M138 kit enables two-way satellite connectivity for IoT projects

Swarm M138 Satellite Transceiver Kit

Sparkfun has launched a Satellite Transceiver Kit based on the Swarm M138 satellite and GNSS modem that allows low-bitrate two-way connectivity for IoT projects anywhere on earth. Remote IoT applications have benefited from LPWAN standards such as LoRaWAN and NB-IoT, but in some extreme cases coverage may still be challenging, so satellite communication may be the only practical option. It used to be really expensive, but Swarm makes this more affordable, and companies like SigFox and Semtech also have (or had?) plans to use low-earth orbit satellites for their respective LPWAN technologies. Swarm M138 kit content and specifications: Swarm M138 mini PCIe satellite modem and GNSS receiver module MCU – Arm Cortex-M4 microcontroller Up to 1 Kbps data rate, up to 912 bytes packet size Frequency 137-138 MHz (downlink) 148-150 MHz (uplink) Dimensions – 51.0 x 30.0 x 5.3 mm Weight – 9.6 grams Temperature Range – -40°C to +85°C […]

Getting Started with CrowBot BOLT smart robot car

Elecrow CrowBot BOLT & Game Controller Assembled

CrowBot BOLT is a smart robot car based on an ESP32 wireless microcontroller and designed for the education market with the ability to program the robot with visual programming, Arduino, or MicroPython. Elecrow sent me a sample of the CrowBot BOLT kit for evaluation so I’ll have a look at the hardware, show how to assemble it, showcase the features of the built-in firmware, and demonstrate how to program the robot with visual programming, Arduino, and MicroPython using some of the provided code samples. CrowBot BOLT unboxing The package lists some of the highlights with 16 teaching courses, support for multiple programming platforms, scalability with Grove connectors, and the inclusion of the Joystick that’s also programmable. The CrowBot BOLT comes as a kit so there will need to be some work to do to assemble the robot, but no soldering is required (in normal cases, more on that later). The […]

PiTalk 4G HAT for Raspberry Pi / 4G USB dongle targets M2M and IoT applications (Crowdfunding)

PiTalk 4G Raspberry Pi HAT USB Dongle

PiTalk is a 4G cellular connectivity solution based on Quectel EG25-G LTE Cat 4 module intended for M2M and IoT applications, and available either as a Raspberry Pi HAT or as a USB dongle. There’s also a PiTalk 2G HAT, but we’ll focus on the 4G hardware in this article. PiTalk supports data rates up to 150 Mbps downlink and 50 Mbps uplink, integrates GNSS support, and as its name implies you can also make and receive calls, or send/receive SMS messages for the device provide you connect a display, speaker, and microphone to the Raspberry Pi or other host device. PiTalk 4G IoT HAT specifications: Quectel EG25-G 4G LTE cellular  module: Cellular 3G and 4G LTE with 2G fallback Max. 150Mbps DL/ 50Mbps UL Global bands support 4G LTE-FDD: B1/B2/B3/B4/B5/B7/B8/B12/B13/B18/B19/B20/B25/B26/B28 4G LTE-TDD: B38/B39/B40/B41 3G WCDMA: B1/B2/B4/B5/B6/B8/B19 2G GSM: B2/B3/B5/B8 GNSS – Qualcomm IZat location technology Gen8C Lite (GPS, GLONASS, […]

Arducam OCam AI camera adds context to video streams in real-time with the PhysicO platform

Arducam OCam

Arducam OCam, whose name stands for Object Camera, is an AI camera with 3 TOPS of AI performance and designed to work with OStream‘s PhysicO Edge AI media platform that adds context to MP4 video streams in real-time. The camera supports resolutions from QVGA to 2K, takes USB or PoE power, comes with a drag-and-drop AI pipeline for easy programming/configuration, and is also compatible with common AI tools such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, Edge Impulse, and others. Arducam OCam specifications: Resolution – QVGA up to 2K Frame Rate – Up to 60 fps FoV – 80° Audio – Dual beamforming AI processing power – Up to 3 TOPS Power Supply 5V via USB PoE Power Consumption – Up to 5 Watts Dimensions – 10 cm Φ x 3 cm Weight – 400 grams As I understand it, the AI pipeline – named ObjectAgent – runs on the camera itself, and adds […]

Inkplate 2 is a 2.13-inch WiFi ePaper display programmable with Arduino or MicroPython (Crowdfunding)

Inkplate 2 ESP32 color epaper display

Inkplate 2 wireless ePaper display is by far the smallest display from Soldered Electronics with a 2.13-inch 3-color ePaper display while previous Inkplate models rely on 6-inch to 9.7-inch ePaper displays. The tiny display board integrates an ESP32 dual-core wireless microcontroller that drives the display, provides WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity plus some I/Os, and can be programmed with the Arduino IDE or MicroPython. Inkplate 2 specifications: Wireless module – ESP32-WROVER-E module with ESP32 dual-core microcontroller with Wi-Fi 4 & Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity, 8MB PSRAM, 4MB flash (Note: The product’s description lists 8MB flash, and 4MB RAM, but there’s no ESP32-WROVER-E in this configuration) Antenna- External IPX antenna Display – 2.13-inch ePaper display with 212×104 resolution (111 DPI) Red, black, and white colors 15 seconds full refresh time (no partial update) USB – 1x USB Type-C port for power and programming via CH340 USB to TLL chip Expansion 20-pin header with […]

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