Raspberry Pi Pico (1 Viewer)

[stevec]

Having seen how much the small Arduino boards are now I’m thinking of trying out the Pi Pico which sells at 3.60. Quite a lot of “bang per buck” . The Arduino IDE can be used to program it. Has anyone played with this board. They do one with WiFi for £6.30.

 

[Two on Tour]

Are there the libraries to support the Pi Pico in Arduino IDE?

By the time you have added P&P your Pico W is coming out towards a tenner whereas something like the Wemos D1 mini's are less than £3.70 delivered.

 

[Gromett]

Have a look at the ESP32 if you want wifi.

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[Gromett]

Raspberry Pi Pico vs ESP32

This article presents a detailed comparison between ESP32 and Raspberry Pi Pico. Follow this article for further guidance.

linuxhint.com

 

[Two on Tour]

The ESP32's are WiFi and Bluetooth whereas the ESP8266's are just WiFi and cheaper than the ESP32's.

 

[stevec]

Are there the libraries to support the Pi Pico in Arduino IDE?

By the time you have added P&P your Pico W is coming out towards a tenner whereas something like the Wemos D1 mini's are less than £3.70 delivered.

I believe the Arduino IDE support is fairly recent. I haven't looked into the libraries but assume they are there.

Thanks for the heads up on the Wemos D1. Thats more like the price I was paying for the Pro mini. But from China. UK supplied ones are more like £7 to £8. I tend to buy these boards 3 or 4 at a time so postage gets spread across a few. You never know when one might come in handy!

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[Two on Tour]

Thanks for the heads up on the Wemos D1. Thats more like the price I was paying for the Pro mini. But from China. UK supplied ones are more like £7 to £8. I tend to buy these boards 3 or 4 at a time so postage gets spread across a few. You never know when one might come in handy!

This is the guy that I have ben buying my Wemos D1 mini's from, £2.99 + 68p P&P

ESP8266 Wemos D1 Mini ESPHOME UK NodeMCU WIFI Arduino HOME ASSISTANT | eBay

Wemos D1 mini. Compatible with MicroPython, Arduino, NodeMCU. Compatible NodeMCU firmware. 1x ESP8266 D1 Mini Wi-Fi Module. Compatible with Arduino IDE. 11 digital IO, interrupt / PWM/ I2C /one-wire supported (except D0).

www.ebay.co.uk

 

[stevec]

This is the guy that I have ben buying my Wemos D1 mini's from, £2.99 + 68p P&P

ESP8266 Wemos D1 Mini ESPHOME UK NodeMCU WIFI Arduino HOME ASSISTANT | eBay

Wemos D1 mini. Compatible with MicroPython, Arduino, NodeMCU. Compatible NodeMCU firmware. 1x ESP8266 D1 Mini Wi-Fi Module. Compatible with Arduino IDE. 11 digital IO, interrupt / PWM/ I2C /one-wire supported (except D0).

www.ebay.co.uk

Thanks. Guess I didn’t look far enough. I’ll order up a couple. I don’t normally need loads of I/o and the WiFi adds a new dimension.

it would be nice to see what people have used these little boards for.

 

[Gromett]

The ESP32's are WiFi and Bluetooth whereas the ESP8266's are just WiFi and cheaper than the ESP32's.

ESP8266 less memory and slower cpu also amongst other things.

£2.75 vs £5.25 from ebay after a quick glance. I personally just stocked up on the ESP32. Although to be fair I have a big box of controllers and components but not got round to doing anything with them yet

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[Two on Tour]

it would be nice to see what people have used these little boards for.

My last project was using an ESP8266 board to control a servo which allows me to control a vent for our diesel heater.
I use the Blynk app on my phone to control the ESP8266 and change the vent opening angle.

Do a search on Youtube for ESP8266 or ESP32 and it will bring up loads of projects for the boards.
Have a look at Blynk as it is a really handy app.

 

[stevec]

Here is my latest Arduino project. A display for the Victron VEDirect bus of my solar charger. It used a Uno as the display plugged in directly. Saves me getting my phone out!

 

[dpsuk999]

I like that can you share how you did it please?

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[stevec]

I like that can you share how you did it please?

I already had the Uno and the 480 * 320 3.5" display which I had bought in for another project.
The software was a bit of a mix of test software for the LCD display and some software from this guy:
. (follow the links he gives)

Plus a copy of the Victron VE.Direct protocol. I had just bought a Smartsolar 100/30 and had this rigged up to a battery and a bench power supply to test it. I haven't actually installed it yet.

I have since rotated the display 90 degrees as it seemed to work better in landscape format.

I know all this info is available on the Victron Connect app but I just fancied having this info available at a glance rather than fire up the app. It was also a nice exercise to do.

I'm thinking of next doing an electro mechanical barograph using the Arduino, atmospheric pressure sensor, servo and stepper (for the drum drive). I'd love a proper one but they are several hundreds of pounds!

 

[dpsuk999]

Thanks stevec I like projects like this to do

 

[heliart]

Having seen how much the small Arduino boards are now I’m thinking of trying out the Pi Pico which sells at 3.60. Quite a lot of “bang per buck” . The Arduino IDE can be used to program it. Has anyone played with this board. They do one with WiFi for £6.30.

Yea, I'm just finishing up my first PICO project. Allotment watering controller, running off a car battery. Sleeps for 23.5 hrs a day, so needed low power.
If you're into Python, then Micropython is probably the easier entry to the PICO, but I wanted low power, so used their provided SDK and coded in C. I get < 1mA with the unit asleep, and it wakes on an external alarm from a RTC module. It works very well, and you can also use a 2nd PICO as a hardware debug probe. All intergrated into Visual Studio Code.
I know a lot of poeple like Auduino, but I never really saw the point if you have the option to use a more standard IDE - but I work in the industry, so my view is slightly skewed.

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[MisterB]

All this is completely new to me, but looking to build something with several servos to programme that automatically go through a sequence of actions (robot?)
I have been advised to use an Arduino but open to other suggestions of something easy to control/programme.

 

[heliart]

All this is completely new to me, but looking to build something with several servos to programme that automatically go through a sequence of actions (robot?)
I have been advised to use an Arduino but open to other suggestions of something easy to control/programme.

It very much depends on what you want to do. Arduino is great for sure esp if you want to learn to program.

For control type of applications (motors, servos etc.), I've had great success running NodeRed on a RaspberryPI. It's a graphical programming environment for this type of control applicaitons. I've an automated dog flap controlled by a Pi Zero W2 and NodeRed. It would be much harded to code in Python or C rather than the flow based NodeRed.
Here's a little snapshot - the RaspberryPi version has native support for the RaspberryPi GPIOs etc.

 

[pappajohn]

Had a Pi 3 and a Sunfounder box of circuit boards and electronic components for years.
Opened to look at them back in the box and shoved it a cupboard.

WHOOSH!!! straight over my head.
Not a clue what to do with it.

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[kevenh]

Had a Pi 3 and a Sunfounder box of circuit boards and electronic components for years.
Opened to look at them back in the box and shoved it a cupboard.

WHOOSH!!! straight over my head.
Not a clue what to do with it.

A media server is number 1 in this Simple Pi Projects list: https://itsfoss.com/raspberry-pi-projects/
But my Pi 3 is gathering dust too...

 

[cbrookson]

I use the Pico W to control and read things in Home Assistant

They have a good way of doing it through ESPhome,
you can also use Arduinos.

So I can read electricity meter pulses, oil tank levels, humidity and temperature etc. Then I can add them to automate and read values for my home Setup and Dashboards.

Cheers

 

[stevec]

Yea, I'm just finishing up my first PICO project. Allotment watering controller, running off a car battery. Sleeps for 23.5 hrs a day, so needed low power.
If you're into Python, then Micropython is probably the easier entry to the PICO, but I wanted low power, so used their provided SDK and coded in C. I get < 1mA with the unit asleep, and it wakes on an external alarm from a RTC module. It works very well, and you can also use a 2nd PICO as a hardware debug probe. All intergrated into Visual Studio Code.
I know a lot of poeple like Auduino, but I never really saw the point if you have the option to use a more standard IDE - but I work in the industry, so my view is slightly skewed.

I'm retired from the industry having started with TTL then was dragged screaming and kicking into the microprocessor age! I was using the Codewarrior IDE and programming in C. I didn't know that the Pico had a more "professional" IDE. Where did you find it?

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[Gromett]

The big beauty of the arduino is the range of libraries available, the support, the community etc.

I love my Pi for doing more serious stuff. Pi Hole is fantastic for example and I am working (slowly) on a media library I can remotely control via a web browser.