When Raspberry Pi introduced the RP2350 household of microcontrollers, its first to characteristic RISC-V cores and a significant specification increase over the unique RP2040, it additionally introduced the in-house Raspberry Pi Pico 2 — nevertheless it’s not alone: third-party boards based mostly on the identical chip at the moment are obtainable, providing the whole lot from smaller footprints to greater specs.
Yesterday’s unveiling of the RP2350, Raspberry Pi’s second in-house microcontroller design and third in-house chip, introduced with it modifications designed to deal with virtually each criticism anybody had concerning the earlier RP2040: newer and quicker Arm Cortex-M33 cores, virtually twice the reminiscence, help for as much as 16MB of exterior pseudo-static RAM (PSRAM), a further programmable enter/output (PIO) block for as much as 12 state machines, and the shock inclusion of a pair of processor cores based mostly on the free and open supply Hazard3 design.
Pimoroni’s Pico Plus 2 affords an upgraded tackle the Raspberry Pi Pico 2 design, with 16MB of flash and 8MB PSRAM. (📷: Pimroni)
Whereas the RP2350 powers Raspberry Pi’s personal Pico 2 board, it is not alone available on the market: a broad vary of corporations have introduced their very own RP2350 units, benefiting from the foremost efficiency and safety upgrades on supply from the brand new half. Sheffield, UK-based Pimoroni was one of many first, asserting a small-form-factor PGA2350 breakout board, the slightly-larger USB Sort-C succesful Tiny2350, and the Pico Plus 2 — a substitute for the official Raspberry Pi Pico 2 providing 16MB of flash fairly than the standard 4MB and 8MB of PSRAM.
The corporate has additionally confirmed that it’s upgrading its application-specific boards, asserting a Plasma 2350 LED management board, whereas additionally launching the Explorer — an “electronics playground” that pairs a built-in show with a solderless breadboard space for on-the-go improvement and experimentation. As an early adopter of the unique Raspberry Pi RP2040, extra Pimoroni designs are anticipated to observe within the coming weeks and months.
Adafruit has introduced Feather- and Metro-format boards that includes the brand new RP2350. (📷: Adafruit)
Adafruit, one other RP2040 fan, has introduced its personal vary of boards constructed across the new RP2350, beginning with the Adafruit Feather RP2350, which packs 8MB of flash and a flat versatile circuit (FFC) connector for the RP2350’s new high-speed transmission (HSTX) peripheral. The corporate has additionally confirmed an Arduino UNO-format board, the Metro RP2350, and — as with Pimoroni — extra designs are anticipated to observe sooner or later. SparkFun, likewise, has introduced an RP2350 design: the SparkFun Professional Micro, which — like Pimoroni’s Pico Plus 2 — contains 16MB of flash reminiscence and 8MB of PSRAM.
Solder Celebration has up to date its personal designs to make use of the brand new chip, providing a small-footprint RP2350 Stamp together with a feature-packed RP2350 Stamp XL design — the latter of which comes with a brand new provider board choice. WIZnet has introduced the W5100S-EVB-Pico2, W5500-EVB-Pico2 and W6100-EVB-Pico2, Raspberry Pi Pico 2 clones which embrace on-board wired Ethernet, whereas The place Labs has introduced deliberate Bus Pirate 5XL and Bus Pirate 6 debug units utilizing the brand new chip. For the roboticists, Cytron Applied sciences has designed the MOTION 2350 Professional, whereas Seeed Studio has a compact XIAO RP2350 board that gives entry to 19 general-purpose enter/output (GPIO) pins regardless of its small measurement.
Arguably probably the most attention-grabbing new product announcement is the Thumby Colour, a tiny handheld console — searching for all of the world like somebody shrank a Nintendo Recreation Boy Advance within the wash — which makes use of the Raspberry Pi RP2350 to drive a 128×128 16-bit coloration IPS TFT show. Designed by TinyCircuits as a successor to the corporate’s earlier Thumby, the Thumby Colour lets customers write their very own video games in MicroPython — and is now funding on Kickstarter, with rewards beginning at $49.
Raspberry Pi is sustaining a listing of third-party RP2350-powered boards on its web site; some can be found to order now, whereas others are nonetheless within the prototyping stage.