My main account is dragontamer@lemmy.world. It has turned out that a 2nd account on the federation is a good idea. I’ll use this dragontamer@lemmy.ca account when lemmy.world gets DDOSed (or other such events), allowing me to continue posting and moderating even if my main account goes down.

  • 8 Posts
  • 11 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: June 30th, 2023
  • dragontamer@lemmy.catoMICROCONTROLLERS@lemux.minnix.dev•Adafruit's Metro ESP32-S3 Puts Two Cores, 8MB PSRAM, and 16MB Flash in an Arduino UNO FootprintEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    I realize this story is about the ESP32-S3, but the OTHER board discussed in that article is way more intriguing to me.

    This, in turn, followed on from the Metro M7, based on NXP’s i.MX RT1011 “crossover microcontroller unit” — offering a much more powerful take on the Arduino UNO form factor, which itself has since been updated with the release of the modernized UNO R4 Minima and WiFi.

    Wait, wut? They’ve got an i.MX unit? Well now I’m super intrigued. I’ve posted about the difference between Microcontrollers and Microprocessors in my guides. But the i.MX series from NXP tries to toe the line inbetween the two categories. A Cortex M7 though is still solidly “Microcontroller” to me, but any i.MX will intrigue me because its specs are incredibly high for a uC (or incredibly low-power for a uP).

    With regards to Arduino form factor… the size roughly compares to 3x AA NiMH cells or larger 18650 Li-ion cells. Its a good size for portable applications, though a bit larger than something you’d reliably put inside a pocket (big pockets can probably fit Arduino form factor + batteries though).

    Adafruit themselves seem to be most interested in the Cosplay-electronics community, so something like this would be a wearable that you’d hide in your costume somewhere. (Ex: controlling the lights to an Overwatch costume or other “techie” video game costume that needs a lot of lights, fiber optics, and the like).

    In any case: that’s three boards with three different sets of capabilities: from the lowly RP2040, to ESP32-S3, to i.MX Cortex M7 “crossover” chip.

  • dragontamer@lemmy.catoMICROCONTROLLERS@lemux.minnix.dev•How to Send Alerts From Raspberry Pi Pico W to a Phone or TabletEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    I hate this setup.

    Rasp. Pi Pico W has a Wi-Fi card. Cool. The WiFi connects to your local WiFi network, which connects to your ISP, which connects to the internet, which connects to ntfy.sh. NTFY.sh then creates a push notification over Apple and/or Android, then finds your Phone, likely realizing your phone is currently in your WiFi network. It then sends a message to your ISP, to send a message to your WiFi network, which sends a message to your Phone and you finally get the alert.

    Its probably the easiest way to get things done, but a bluetooth alert and/or Wifi-direct alert of some kind would be better. Phone APIs don’t seem too keen on WiFi / Socket servers however. Bluetooth would likely be a better solution, but involves pairing and other such noise to complicate the process.

    Hmmmmm. I see that ntfy.sh is the easiest way to bridge it all together. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

  • dragontamer@lemmy.catoMICROCONTROLLERS@lemux.minnix.dev•STM32 Oscilloscope Uses All The FeaturesEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    Microcontroller ADCs still have a bad reputation compared to “hardcore” analog designers, but STM32 isn’t bad in the great scheme of uCs.

    https://hackaday.io/project/188051-rpscope

    Here’s the original project, and with a circuit layout closer to what I’d expect to be typical. However, notice that the STM32 contains all the parts that are in the rpscope: STM32 has an ADC (albeit a slower one), multiple OpAmps (albeit with lower accuracy), and a microcontroller (albeit with less RAM than the RP2040).

    Shrinking and consolidation is the goal for these devices, leading to far cheaper designs with possibly better reliability (now that its all put together in one package). Of course, the specs are far weaker on the STM32 rather than dedicated ADCs, but you can see the size, cost, and power/watt difference by just looking at this thing.

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