sensors News - Page 9 of 18 - CNX Software

August 25, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Raspberry Shake HAT brings earthquake monitoring to the Raspberry Pi SBC

Raspberry Shake is a family of Raspberry Pi HATs and full seismograph and infrasound monitors designed to enable earthquake monitoring on the popular single board computer Raspberry Pi Shake and Boom (for acoustic monitoring) HATs have been around for a few years, but I only learned about it now through an article on The MagPi Magazine where Branden Christensen, Business Steward, and Mike Hotchkiss, Marketing Director, were interviewed, so I decided to have a closer look. Four main models of the Raspberry Shake are available: RS1D vertical motion seismograph with a single motion velocity sensor to detect earthquakes RS3D vertical & lateral motion seismograph with one vertical & two lateral motion velocity sensors to measure earthquakes of all magnitudes RS4D “strong motion seismograph with one vertical motion velocity sensor to detect earthquakes, plus one extra vertical and two lateral accelerometer sensors for powerful earthquakes RS&BOOM seismograph & infrasound monitor that […]

August 24, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

TRACEPaw sensorized paw helps legged robots “feel the floor” with Arduino Nicla Vision

Our four-legged friends don’t walk on tarmac the same way as they do on ice or sand as they can see and feel the floor with their eyes and nerve endings and adapt accordingly. The TRACEPaw open-source project, which stands for “Terrain Recognition And Contact force Estimation through Sensorized Legged Robot Paw“, aims to bring the same capabilities to legged robots. Autonomous Robots Lab achieves this through the Arduino Nicla Vision board leveraging its camera and microphone to run machine learning models on the STM32H7 Cortex-M7 microcontroller in order to determine the type of terrain and estimate the force exercized on the leg. But the camera is apparently not used to look at the terrain, but instead, at the deformation of the silicone hemisphere – made of “Dragon Skin” – at the end of the leg to estimate 3D force vectors, while the microphone is used to recognize terrain types […]

August 24, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Seguro 150 Bluetooth and NFC temperature logger works without mobile app (for the receiver)

Sensified.io Seguro 150 is a 4mm thick waterproof temperature logger designed for cold chain shipping applications in the food and healthcare industries and can also be used in retail settings. Most IoT devices require you to install some type of proprietary app, but the Seguro 150 is said not to require any app for the receiver and the temperature logger instead relies on Bluetooth LE and NFC so he/she can tap his/her phone to access the data and it’s also possible to receive PDF or Excel reports by email. Seguro 150 specifications: Wireless Bluetooth LE 5.0 up to 2Mbps Near-field communications (NFC) up to 10mm range Protocol – Type 4 Tag Emulation Temperature measurement Temperature Range – -30°C to +40°C Thresholds – High, Low Measurement Response – Sampling Interval, Start Delay Buffer – 7 days with 2-minute sampling to 7 months with 60-minute sampling Misc – Multi-color LED Battery – […]

August 23, 2023August 23, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

SenseCAP T1000 – A credit card-sized LoRaWAN GPS tracker based on Semtech LR1110 (Crowdfunding)

SenseCAP T1000 is an ultra-thin credit-card-sized GPS tracker with Semtech LR1110 wireless chip with LoRaWAN, WiFi (scanning), and GNSS connectivity, plus two built-in sensors to monitor temperature, light intensity, and motion. We’ve covered several LTE IoT and LoRaWAN GPS trackers in the past and even tested the RAK811 LoRa GPS Tracker board with our own gateway, but the SenseCAP T1000 is particularly attractive due to its slim design. It works both indoors and outdoors with IP65 waterproof protection, looks quite easy to set up with its button and LED, and also integrates an SOS feature that can be triggered with a long press. SenseCAP T1000 specifications: Wireless Semtech LoRa Edge LR1110 Asset Management Platform LoRa/(G)FSK Half-Duplex RF transceiver working in the 150 – 960MHz; compatible with LoRaWAN 1.0.4 standard GNSS (GPS/ BeiDou) low-power scanning 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi ultra-low-power passive scanning Unnamed Bluetooth 5.1 LE chip for initial configuration and indoor positioning […]

August 18, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

Orbbec Femto Bolt 3D depth and RGB USB-C camera supports Microsoft ToF technology

Orbbec Femto Bolt is a 3D depth and RGB USB-C camera developed in collaboration with Microsoft and integrating the same ToF (Time-of-Flight) technology as found in the Microsoft Azure Kinect camera module and HoloLens 2 mixed reality head-mounted display. The new model follows the launch of the fully integrated Femto Mega featuring an NVIDIA Jetson Nano module introduced in January with the same ToF technology, so the new USB-C camera simply allows a wider selection of hosts. Orbbec has also launched the Femto Mega I variant with an IP65 metal enclosure. Orbbec Femto Bolt specifications: Cameras Depth camera 1 Mega Pixel ToF sensor 850nm wavelength 0.25 to 5.45m range depending on the depth mode Up to 1024×1024 @ 15 fps (WFoV) or 640×579 @ 30 fps (NFoV) FoV Wide – H: 120°; V: 120° Narrow – H: 75°; V: 65° RGB camera 4K resolution up to 3840×2160 @ 25 fps […]

August 7, 2023July 5, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

SunFounder Zeus Car Kit review – A fun toy and Arduino learning tool

SunFounder Zeus Car Kit is an Arduino UNO and ESP32 Cam-based educational kit for children (and adults) that can be used to learn more about electronics, robotics, and programming. It’s a car comprised of four 6cm Mecanum wheels for omnidirectional motion and various sensors that can be controlled with an Android app enabling first-person view (FPV) thanks to the built-in camera. The company sent us a Zeus Car Kit for review and evaluation, and after assembly, we’ll use it in “Play Mode”, or in other words a toy that basically works out of the box, before checking out the “Programing Mode” and related Arduino tutorials to evaluate it’s educational potential. Zeus Car Kit Unboxing The kit comes in a nice retail package which highlights some of the capacities of the kit: FPV, Omnidrive, AI vision, compass, IR control, APP control, and RGB lights. The package itself contains four more boxes […]

August 6, 2023August 5, 2023 by Paisit Wongsongsarn - 13 Comments

SONOFF SNZB-01P/SNZB-02P Review – Zigbee wireless switch and temperature & humidity sensor tested with Home Assistant

SONOFF SNZB-01P & SNZB-02P Zigbee Review Home Assistant

SONOFF launched their 1st gen Zigbee product about a few years ago, and SONOFF have finally started to upgrade their Zigbee devices, and we received two Zigbee 3.0 devices from SONOFF for review, namely the SNZB-01P wireless switch and the SNZB-02P temperature and humidity Sensor. In a nutshell, their appearance looks more modern, with a round shape compared to the rectangular design of the previous models. Importantly, they are sturdier than before, and the battery capacity has increased almost 2x. As we anticipated, they can be used with other Zigbee Hubs from different brands as well. The main application used with both devices is still, of course, eWeLink, which many people are familiar with (a Zigbee Bridge Hub/Bridge is required). However, this review will focus more on the popular app called Home Assistant, which is widely used globally. SNZB-01P wireless switch After trying it out for a while and comparing […]

July 30, 2023 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Robo Pico review – A Raspberry Pi Pico W-based motor & sensor control board tested with BocoBot robotic kit

Robo Pico Review Raspberry Pi Zero W robot

Cytron Robo Pico is a carrier board for the Raspberry Pi Pico (W) specially designed for robotics & IoT applications with a 2-channel DC motor driver, four servo motor ports, and seven Grove I/O connectors to connect various sensors and/or actuators. When the company asked us to review the Robo Pico board, I noticed they had a car robotic kit based on the board called the BocoBot that comes with installation videos and five tutorials including obstacle avoidance movement with ultrasonic sensors, light search, line following, and WiFi remote control. So I asked for the full kit to make the review more fun and interesting. Robo Pico board Robo Pico specifications: Supported MCU board – Raspberry Pi Pico/Pico W and compatible Motor control 2x DC Motor terminals with Motor status LEDs for each motor terminal 2x motor test buttons for each motor terminal Header to connect to 4x servos Expansion […]