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January 9, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Pilet is a Raspberry Pi 5-powered modular, portable computer with 5-inch or 7-inch display, optional built-in keyboard (Crowdfunding)

Pilet is a modular, open-source hardware, portable computer designed for the Raspberry Pi 5 SBC, and equipped with a choice of displays, keyboards, and an optional battery module that can last for up to 7 hours. Two models are available: the Pilet 5 with a 5-inch display, an integrated keyboard, a trackball, a scroll wheel, a navigational switch (D-Pad), and game buttons, and the Pilet 7 with a larger 7-inch display and support for detachable modules such as a keyboard, gamepad, or deck. Pilet specifications: Supported SBC – Raspberry Pi 5 Storage – MicroSD card, NVMe SSD via module Display Pilet 5 – 5-inch IPS MIPI DSI display with 1280×800 resolution, capacitive touch screen. Pilet 7 – 7-inch IPS MIPI DSI display with 1280×800 resolution, capacitive touch screen. Video Output- 2x micro HDMI ports Networking Gigabit Ethernet RJ45 port 802.11ac WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 Optional LTE cellular via module […]

January 6, 2025January 6, 2025 by Debashis Das - 8 Comments

PiSugar3 is a low-cost Raspberry Pi UPS module with RTC, hardware battery protection, and power management features

PiSugar Kitchen’s PiSugar3 is a compact Raspberry Pi UPS module with integrated power management features that make Raspberry Pi Zero boards portable. This new module is an upgraded version of the PiSugar S and PiSugar S Pro, which we previously wrote about. The PiSugar S features a compact 1,200mAh battery for Raspberry Pi Zero, and the PiSugar S Pro comes with a 5,000mAh battery for Raspberry Pi 3/4. The PiSugar3 adds new features to these models with upgrades including an RTC, and a fully functional UPS functionality with customizable wake-up options. It also includes an anti-mistaken touch switch to avoid accidental shutdowns, a software watchdog, and hardware battery protection to extend battery longevity. The UPS module gets attached to the bottom of the Pi and there are pogo pins on the UPS module that deliver the power while the GPIO pins of the Pi remain free for other tasks, on top […]

January 5, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Khadas Mind Maker Kit review – Part 2: Windows 11 Pro on an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V AI mini PC

I’ve already gone through the specifications and an unboxing of the “Khadas Mind 2 AI Maker Kit” powered by an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V “Lunar Lake” processor delivering up to 115 TOPS of AI performance and equipped with 32GB LPDDR5X RAM and a 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD in the first part of the review. I’ve now spent time with the mini PC/developer kit which is now simply called “Khadas Mind Maker Kit”, and I will report my experience with the Windows 11 Home 24H2 operating system in the second part of the review testing features, running benchmarks including an AI benchmark, evaluating networking and storage performance, testing the thermal design while under stress, and taking measurements for fan noise and power consumption. It looks like some AI features may finally be usable on Windows, but I’ll test that in a separate post since everything is new and Microsoft Copilot+, […]

December 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Iridium Certus 9704 Satellite IoT Developer Kit supports Arduino programming, integrates with Blynk IoT Cloud

Iridium Certus 7904 Satellite IoT Developer Kit is a compact Arduino-programmable devkit with satellite connectivity, a microSD card for data storage, USB and LiPo battery power support, and various expansion options designed for IoT and M2M applications. Featuring a pre-provisioned Iridium Certus 9704 module, the developer kit also supports expansion headers and connectors for Adafruit FeatherWing modules, Arduino Shields, Qwiic/STEMMA QT modules, and Arduino I2C (ESLOV) add-on boards. We have written about several Iridium satellite solutions over many years, but I think it’s the first time we’ve come across an easy-to-use Satellite IoT development kit programmable with the Arduino IDE and with Blynk IoT Cloud integration. Iridium Certus 9704 Satellite IoT Developer Kit specifications: Iridium Certus 9704 Module Max Message Size – 100 KB including images & soundbites through IMT (Iridium Messaging Transport) service Command Interface – JSON-Based Serial Protocol for REST (JSPR) Interfaces – Serial data; SPI; GPIOs; GNSS […]

December 18, 2024December 18, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Orange Pi CM5 “Tablet” Base Board drops Ethernet for WiFi 5, adds battery support, M.2 socket, 26-pin GPIO header…

The Orange Pi CM5 was launched as an alternative to Raspberry Pi CM4/CM5 last July with a Rockchip RK3588S octa-core Cortex-A76/A55 SoC, up to 16GB LPDDR4x, 256GB eMMC flash, and three board-to-board connectors maintaining partially compatibility with the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4. At the time, Orange Pi also introduced the Orange Pi CM5 Base Board with HDMI 2.1, one Gigabit Ethernet port, two 2.5GbE ports, USB 3.0/2.0 ports, four camera connectors, and more. The company has now launched the Orange Pi CM5 “Tablet” Base Board without Ethernet ports, making use of WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 for networking instead. It keeps many of the same features but adds a 26-pin GPIO header, an M.2 Key-M socket for SSD storage, DP 1.4 and MIPI DSI display interfaces, and various audio interfaces. However, it does with “only” three camera interfaces. It’s quite thick to be used in a typical tablet, but […]

December 4, 2024December 5, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Silicon Labs SiWG917Y and SiWN917Y are ultra-low power WiFi 6 and Bluetooth LE 5.4 IoT modules

Silicon Labs SiWG917Y and SiWN917Y are pre-certified, ultra-low power 2.4 GHz WiFi 6 and Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) 5.4 modules made as an extension of the Wireless Gecko Series 2 Arm Cortex-M33 microcontroller family and designed for IoT applications such as Smart Home devices, building automation solutions, healthcare devices, industrial sensors, and asset trackers. The SiWG917Y module is used as a standalone solution where all application code runs on an Arm Cortex-M4 core, and the SiWN917Y module is designed as a Network Co-processor so customers can execute their application on a separate MCU while the wireless module manages WiFi 6 and BLE 5.4. Silicon Labs SiWx917Y modules specifications: Microcontroller MCU Arm Cortex-M4F application core up to 180 MHz (225 DMIPS performance) Arm Cortex-M4 network wireless processor running up to 160 MHz, Accelerators – Integrated FPU, MPU, NVIC, Matrix vector processor (MVP) Memory 672 KB embedded SRAM shared by Cortex-M4 and […]

December 3, 2024December 2, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

Matter 1.4 specification improves multi-admin and energy management, adds new devices like solar panels, batteries, and water heaters

We covered the Matter 1.3 specification in May 2024, but the Connectivity Standards Alliance is wasting no time and the Matter 1.4 specification is already out with features and improvements such as “Enhanced Multi-Admin”, Matter certifiable Home Routers and Access Points, energy management enhancements, and several new device types such as solar power equipment and batteries. Matter has been deployed in millions of Smart Home products in just a few years and aims to enable interoperability between devices from multiple vendors. Paisit reviewed a few Matter products from SONOFF including the MINIR4M Smart Switch, SONOFF Zigbee Bridge Ultra, and SwitchMan M5 Matter wall switch, and while Matter interoperability is working since devices can be controlled from Matter-compatible apps (e.g. Apple Home), users do lose some features found in the “native” app such as eWelink in the case of SONOFF devices. Matter 1.4 key improvements and new features: Home Routers and […]

October 29, 2024October 31, 2024 by Debashis Das - 4 Comments

CodeCell is a ESP32-C3 mini development board for robots, wearables, smart home projects

CodeCell ESP32 C3 mini development board

Engineer and YouTuber Carl Bugeja recently developed CodeCell, a tiny ESP32-C3 development board designed as the brain for robots, wearables, and smart home devices. This module features a nine-axis inertial measurement unit (IMU) for motion fusion and an optional VCNL4040 light sensor. It includes a USB Type-C port for data and power as well as a lithium-polymer battery with a charging circuit. Measuring just 18.5 x 18.5mm this compact board is even smaller than other tiny ESP32 development boards such as Waveshare’s ESP32-S3-Zero and Seeed Studio’s XIAO ESP32S3. However, the Epi C3 is smaller at 23 x 12.75 mm, and so are the Unexpected Maker NANOS3 (25 x 10 mm) and Unexpected Maker OMGS3 (28 x 11 mm). CodeCel ESP32-C3 mini development board specification Microcontroller – ESP32-C3 RISC-V MCU 160MHz 32-bit RISC-V processor core 400kB SRAM, 4MB flash storage Wi-Fi 4 and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) connectivity Sensors Vishay VCNL4040 light […]