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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Raspberry Pi enters microcontrer game with a $4 Pico
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lew247 Guru  Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
taken from here In many ways, the Pico is a well-appointed microcontroller board. It has 26 3.3 V GPIOs, a standard ARM Serial Wire Debug (SWD) port, USB host or device capabilities, two UARTs, two I2Cs, two SPIs, and 16 PWM channels in eight groups.  RP2040 has a dual-core Cortex M0+ with luxurious amounts of SRAM 2MB of flash, USB connectivity, and nice power management Edited 2021-01-21 21:19 by lew247 |
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| lew247 Guru Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
Some interesting addons for this board available and more soon https://shop.pimoroni.com/collections/pico vga/audi adaptor quad expander The big question is Could MM be ported to run on this board? it's only 3.60 in the UK Edited 2021-01-21 22:11 by lew247 |
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| lizby Guru Joined: 17/05/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 3300 |
I saw it announced by Pi Hut earlier today and ordered one. Tried to order from a Canadian vendor, but they wanted $12 shipping for a $5 (Canadian) part. Cheaper to have it come from Great Britain. PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed |
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RetroJoe Senior Member  Joined: 06/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 290 |
Interesting development - the crowded microcontroller market gets even more crowded. The comments on the Hackaday article are quite vitriolic regarding the wholesale hoarding, gouging and scamming going on in the Raspberry Pi ecosystem. I tend to agree - the barebones Pi SBC is marketed as a $35 device, but you can't get one for anything like that price. Apparently the same is true for the Zero, and most likely will be for the Pico. I have been dabbling with the ESP32 (via the TTGO VGA32) which appears to have a very vibrant Arduino-based community support, is a remarkable value (e.g. integrated WiFi and BT), and has a diverse and competitive supply chain that effectively eliminates price gouging. MMBASIC on the TTGO VGA - now THAT would be something! Edited 2021-01-22 04:47 by RetroJoe Enjoy Every Sandwich / Joe P. |
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vegipete Guru Joined: 29/01/2013 Location: CanadaPosts: 1121 |
I ponder that too from time to time - do I need yet another dev board toy? Have you tried the TTGO with FabGL? Visit Vegipete's *Mite Library for cool programs. |
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hitsware2 Guru Joined: 03/08/2019 Location: United StatesPosts: 715 |
> Amaze your friends by showing them you still own a D-sub cable! > Bask in the glory of 15-bit analog video! > Get teary eyed over the warm, authentic, RC filtered PWM audio! I cannot resist !  > The big question is Could MM be ported to run on this board? Is that really the end all ? ( I did imagine ( when I saw the "Pico" ) that perhaps it had BBCBasic on RAM ) ....  my site |
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| zeitfest Guru Joined: 31/07/2019 Location: AustraliaPosts: 549 |
Looking at it briefly, the examples seem a bit python-centered so far. If it is the first silicon designed by the team I would expect a few revisions yet !! I would like to see C examples for handling interrupts, SD card, spi slave, etc, and can't find them so far. BUT it is VERY cheap.. which brings up the "registered charity" status of pi, which implies assisted development in the UK. When does "hobby" become "product dumping" in contravention of WTO rules ? It is impossible to compete with products that are sold for giveaway prices, with assistance from foreign governments. Wonder what the EC thinks. |
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TassyJim Guru Joined: 07/08/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6213 |
In Australia, it's $5.95 and $8 postage so not too bad. Not as cheap but reasonably comparable with the Arduino nano clones for a complete board. No analogue so the 28 pin PIC32 still holds up well. Jim VK7JH MMedit |
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| lizby Guru Joined: 17/05/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 3300 |
Do pins 31-35 not provide what you want? PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed |
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| TassyJim Guru Joined: 07/08/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6213 |
I should read things better! 3 at 12 bit so not too bad at all. Jim VK7JH MMedit |
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| RetroJoe Senior Member Joined: 06/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 290 |
Indeed I have - that Fabrizio dude seems to be the same sort of wizard of the ESP32 that Geoff, Peter and Mauro are on the MaxiMite. Both the Altair CP/M and VIC20 emulations in the FabGL library appear to be very solid and complete, and the Space Invaders clone is damn near perfect. As far as hobbies go, springing $15 didn't seem too extravagant for a postage stamp device that has keyboard, mouse, VGA, SD, WiFi and BT support, and can faithfully emulate Z80 and 6502 computers and run arcade-style games. It's kinda mind-blowing, actually. As far as I can tell, the only thing "missing" on the TTGO VGA32 is a full complement of ESP32 GPIO pins on the PCB, but it looks like a few of them are available as solder pads. That, and any proper documentation, but that seems to be the trade-off for all dirt-cheap Chinese gadgetry. Fabrizio appears to be an Army of One at this point, so I don't know what the future holds, but I wouldn't be surprised to see someone port MAME or RetroArch-style emulation cores to this thing, other classic 8-bit computer emulations (I'm pretty sure I saw Sinclair and Atari ESP32 stuff floating around...), and ideally a MaxiMite-style instant-on "bare metal" computer, but using MicroPython as the built-in interpreter. Hell, maybe I'll need to figure out how to do that :) It's a great time to be alive for retro computing aficionados !! Edited 2021-01-22 17:39 by RetroJoe Enjoy Every Sandwich / Joe P. |
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| lew247 Guru Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
C++ SDK for the Pico  |
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| lew247 Guru Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
Arduino are making a version of this board with Wifi Bluetooth and 16Mb flash memory Arduino nano version Arduino joins the RP2040 family with one of its most popular formats: the Arduino Nano. The Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect combines the power of RP2040 with high-quality MEMS sensors (a 9-axis IMU and microphone), a highly efficient power section, a powerful WiFi/Bluetooth module, and the ECC608 crypto chip, enabling anybody to create secure IoT applications with this new microcontroller. The Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect will be available for pre-order in the next few weeks. |
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| zeitfest Guru Joined: 31/07/2019 Location: AustraliaPosts: 549 |
[ ed- thanks lew ] My impressions so far - (I can easily be wrong of course) - interrupts are described but some routines look as though they are 16 bit and blocking, - it looks like the "accelerated floating point" actually refers to optimised software math, don't know if it is IEEE compliant - spi master examples are given but not slave, I guess the I/O modues would handle that further - there is some sd card routines but they are in the "in development" section Not sure if the Python version handles interrupts or not. There is a coordinated marketing impetus - some suppliers had supplies ready to ship. Overall I am going to be cautious on it. Bit annoyed that I paid only to find the "accelerated" math is software. edit - the 12bit AD has a 9.5 bit caveat too. Edited 2021-01-22 20:02 by zeitfest |
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| IanT Senior Member Joined: 29/11/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 101 |
Well, the Pico is about the same price here in UK as I'm currently paying just for a 28pin PIC32 chip and I'd probably use the Pico it ran MMB. I'm sure over time they will also be very well supported by third party accessories & expansion boards. It would be a convenient, easily available and affordable (e.g. entry-level) controller board for anyone considering using MMB. Of course, I'm wondering how easy it would be for Peter (he who doesn't seem to need any sleep) to port MMB to this chip, given that the issues he has had with the RPi's ever-changing Linux O/S won't be a factor here. Regards, IanT |
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| matherp Guru Joined: 11/12/2012 Location: United KingdomPosts: 10025 |
FWIW IMHO This chip is a dog. No floating point except S/W, no integer divide, only 32 bit multiply with 32-bit result (not even 64-bit result). Very limited subset of Thumb2 so lots of extra instructions for simple tasks Other than the "Raspberry" name there is absolutely no reason I can see to use it over the ESP32 which is well supported and better in almost every aspect |
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| IanT Senior Member Joined: 29/11/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 101 |
I bow to your Wisdom Oh Mighty One! Thank you sincerely for all your hard work - which benefits us all. Regards, IanT |
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| RetroJoe Senior Member Joined: 06/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 290 |
Ian, it's not for nothing it's called the "Microcontroller and PC" forum :) Thanks as well, Peter, for validating my intuitions about the ESP32. I'm not an MCU guy, but it's a fascinating segment of the computing market. Enjoy Every Sandwich / Joe P. |
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| lew247 Guru Joined: 23/12/2015 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1702 |
It's a shame the ESP32 can't have MM basic I guess it's because it can only run small displays and not the SSd's or vga/hdmi |
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| lizby Guru Joined: 17/05/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 3300 |
There's this VGA module (about which I know no more than that link reveals). PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed |
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