7 ms·

EsPiFF: An ESP32 in the Raspberry Pi form factor

131 points by jicksaw 4y ago

anigbrowl 4y ago
I <3 ESP32, working on microcontrollers is fun and there's a decent variety of tools available. You can run Linux on one ( s l o w l y ) but running on bare metal is more fun. There's a good package ecosystem for working in C or micropython.
Taniwha 4y ago
Does it really have a ground plane directly under the antenna?
- timonoko 4y ago
  Does not matter. "Wifi needs an external antenna". And indeed there is typical Nokia antenna plug on top right.
  - iamflimflam1 4y ago
    That’s a bit weird. The built in PCB antenna on the ESP32 is pretty good. You only generally need an external antenna for some applications. The modules with both the connector and PCB antenna normally hace a jumper resistor to switch between.
    - iamflimflam1 4y ago
      From the readme: Please notice, that the ESP32-module PCB antenna can not be used, an external wifi antenna is required. This is because of space restrictions, the RasPi form factor not allow us to make the board larger, and there is simply no space left for the required keepout area for the PCB antenna. Shame they couldn’t make it work.
      - gregwebs 4y ago
        > Because several people mention the integrated PCB antenna, the version 3.2 offer at least a basic use of the PCB antenna. Still, the external PCB antenna is the prefered way to use Wifi with the EsPiFF, now to use the integrated PCB antenna as well. Keep in mind, that the ESP32-WROVER-IB module requires a solder jumper modification before the PCB antenna can be used.
      - stavros 4y ago
        Also from the Readme: > Because several people mention the integrated PCB antenna, the version 3.2 offer at least a basic use of the PCB antenna. Still, the external PCB antenna is the prefered way to use Wifi with the EsPiFF It's nice that they removed the ground plane, it should be fairly good now.
matthews2 4y ago
> The EsPiFF V3 will bring the following > an RP2040 IO-processor additional to the ESP32 It's a shame that the RP2040 doesn't have a good low power sleep mode. Not really appropriate for battery powered applications.
- dragontamer 4y ago
  > RP2040 There's a lot of shame with the RP2040 in my opinion. 1. No internal oscillator. Always requires external clock. 2. No internal flash. Always requires external flash + somewhat complex startup sequence. 3. ~500uA per MHz current consumption. Much higher than competitors (ex: STM32L1 has 180uA per MHz). This is a relatively power-hungry chip both in active, and sleep, modes. ------- I think RP2040 is some kind of bridge device between the microcontroller and microprocessor worlds. But the M0+ core is an odd choice for this. Real world uCs / processors utilizing a Cortex M7 (or similar) would probably be a better idea? That being said, the ESP32 is high-power (~100mA) due to the radio. Radios always use lots of power, especially during transmit. So the RP2040 probably is fine for this use case.
gregwebs 4y ago
> While it was easy to get a (RPI) solution up and running in a short time, over time we got a lot of problems resulting from using the Pi. A key problem of the Pi's design is, to rely on an SD-card. > after some months the SD-card broke and the application crashed. High-end industrial SD-card lasted longer, but finally still broke. > So we made the decision, to build a replacement, which is focused on high-reliability, but still enable the use of Raspberry Pi universum of add-ons, like HATs and enclosures. We choose the ESP32 dual core, 2x240MHz WROVER module with 8MB PSRAM and 16MB Flash. The EsPiFF, the Esp32 in Raspberry Pi Form Factor was born. > After the EsPiFF is now mature enough, we we are preparing a campaign at Crowd Supply.
- geek_at 4y ago
  I try to never rely on the Pi's SD card. Either I use a system which uses RAM disk like Alpine Linux or a modified Raspbian. You can even PXE boot with later Raspberry Pi3b+ and 4 But yes, then you need network storage or USB SSDs or something
- moffkalast 4y ago
  They decided to design this whole thing instead of just going with a read only SD partition or one of the CM4 docks with eMMC? Don't get me wrong, the end result is really cool and if just an ESP can cover their entire use case then the Pi was definitely overkill, but it just seems like inventing a flying car because you once got a flat tire.
  - cracrecry 4y ago
    We also depend on RPys. Right now the supply chain problems RPys are so big,that they are reselling RP 4s for over 300 euros!! Imagine that over night the price of cars go 3x and you have to wait a long time for them. Different people are finding different alternatives. We also created a very convoluted solution.
    - HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
      That's understandable, but has nothing to do with what the poster was saying.
andrewstuart 4y ago
Does it fit precisely into a raspberry pi case? I don’t see the TRRS audio/composite video connector. It would be good if it also had a VGA output port using USB microB. Esp32 supports these things so it would be nice to see them on this pi “clone”. You might consider the more powerful WROVER-E which has 8MB psram and 16MB flash. https://www.espressif.com/sites/default/files/documentation/esp32-wrover-e_esp32-wrover-ie_datasheet_en.pdf https://www.espressif.com/sites/default/files/documentation/... Add 2 CH599's for only $1 each and you could add 4 USB ports, like the RPi. Fit it into a genuine case then you'd pretty much have a feature match - VGA video, composite NTSC/PAL video, audio, USB ports, sdcard.
timonoko 4y ago
"All I want for Christmas is SD-card reader on my ESP32." - Finds micropython library. Ok. - Finds schematics for physical connection. Ok "But where do I find that fiddly SD-card bracket?" - Opens a drawer, sees a mound of useless MicroSD-adaptors. Ok.
- timonoko 4y ago
  That was easy -- eventually. One only has to believe what the micropython manual says and not watch any instructables-videos. >>> os.mount(machine.SDCard(slot=2),"/sd") >>> os.listdir('/sd') ['DCIM', 'VIDEO', 'PHOTO']
  - timonoko 4y ago
    Using SD-card on ESP8266 was more challenging. upip.install('sdcard') did not work. But ChatGPT truly helped and suggested I find it in Github. https://github.com/micropython/micropython-lib/blob/master/micropython/drivers/storage/sdcard/sdcard.py https://github.com/micropython/micropython-lib/blob/master/m...
- dvh 4y ago
  Esp32-cam has sdcard reader
kkielhofner 4y ago
I love seeing more ESP32 based projects and hardware. It’s a remarkably capable platform with a robust ecosystem that for a “microcontroller” somewhat resembles that of the Raspberry Pi. I have an irrational frustration when I see people doing simple GPIO, etc with a Raspberry Pi 4 (when you used to be able to get them). I mean come on people, it has four cores, gigabytes of RAM, and can drive two 4k displays(at 30Hz) and you’re using a pin?!? The Raspberry Pi has relatively low power consumption compared to what most people are used to with anything x86 but an ESP32 based solution comes in at 1/10 the power consumption (or less), a fraction of the cost, and you can actually get them these days. Then I calm myself down when I remember GPIO on a Raspberry Pi is following one of the 100,000 guides that’s been written on the topic and can be done in a comfortable, standard Linux environment with a few lines of python (or whatever). Question for this project - does anyone know the specific regulatory issues of a “commercial” product that calls for an external WiFi antenna? From my little understanding on the topic it seems that ERP, etc could pose a regulatory issue although I think there are exceptions for low scale/hobby products.
- epx 4y ago
  Wish there was an ESP64 with just enough RAM to run a Debian distro, even slowly, so we could stop waiting for Zeros to get cheaper.
  - squarefoot 4y ago
    You can run Armbian and DietPI (both Debian derivatives) on most small boards; some like the NanoPI NEO are in the same price ballpark as the Pi Zero, but are in stock. https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=69&product_id=132 https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product/product... https://www.armbian.com/download/?device_support=Supported https://www.armbian.com/download/?device_support=Supported https://dietpi.com/#download https://dietpi.com/#download
  - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
    BeagleBone has always been an option. The cool kids just choose to ignore it.
pmontra 4y ago
> writing permanent its log files and swap partition If this is the problem, the solutions are no swap and log2ram https://github.com/azlux/log2ram https://github.com/azlux/log2ram I also noticed that Armbian logs to a ramdisk. I didn't investigate the implementation and if its contents survive a reboot. The only real problems for me are that the SD card will eventually fail no matter what (I mean, much sooner than a SDD or HDD) and that there are basically no Pis at sale at a reasonable price. As a platform it is nearly dead.
- jccooper 4y ago
  They also have a built-in ramdisk overlay, which basically solves the problem (so long as you don't need persistence!)
  - jbuzbee 4y ago
    I use this in a little raspberry pi project. For persistence, I occasionally copy data to a writable partition and then at boot, after the ram overlay is mounted, I copy it back.
- sneak 4y ago
  This seems like a bug in the SSD firmware? I should be able to write zillions of times to the same logical sector, they don't map 1:1 to physical blocks on the flash. I've also run tons of RPis off of SSD root and never had this problem. I hear about it constantly though, so maybe it's urban legend?
- tracker1 4y ago
  I have mostly relied on SSD over USB for my RPi stuff, which takes up more space... With the price hikes on RPi 8GB, I've started just getting the small intel boxes N5000/6000 series mostly, since the cost became not much different than RPi + encloser + power anyway. Thinking about trying to sell my 3x RPi 4b 8gb in DeskPi cases with ~480gb ssds while prices are still pretty inflated.
nevi-me 4y ago
How does one get PCBs with all the components wired in? I've been prototyping for a while, and it would be great for me to learn how to start putting stuff in cases instead of having wires dangling around. I was looking at PBCWay just yesterday, and the process is unclear. If I say that I need some parts, do I have to source them, or can PCBWay/alternative do so for me? EDIT: what software does one use to draw PCBs for production too? I've seen a few options online, perhaps a better question is what preferences there are. One thing I'm curious about is whether that software will say "you need this much resistance between these 2 components".
- sebazzz 4y ago
  I’m also curious how people come from the level “I know C, C++, Arduino, I understand what capacitors, resistors, transitors and diodes do” to the level of “I can integrate a 3.3V Arduino Nano with 5V or more circruitry with logic level shifters, I know when to use certain capacitor types, understand when inrush current conditions can happen, etc”. And I mean just for hobby. Not interested in anything pro.
  - jnovek 4y ago
    I’m also a hobbyist and I think it’s just slow and incremental. This year I decided to expand my electronics hobby into synth stuff. I was by no means prepared for this, but after a year of studying various synth module circuits I’m starting recognize certain patterns when I look at a schematic. Perhaps the hardest part of this process was learning enough to start asking good questions. Everything has gotten so much easier in the last 2 or 3 months because I’ve finally built enough confidence, knowledge and intuition to ask my EE friends why something was designed a certain way. I’ve also learned that they are often equally puzzled. :-) I think it helps if you have a project you’re working towards.
- bonzini 4y ago
  The PCB can be prepared with KiCad or Eagle for example. Then you do a lot of preparation work. You have to prepare the bill of materials, be super careful about the annotation layers on the PCB to prepare a PDF of the components. Finally you pay. :) PCB assembly services exist from various places, for example Seeedstudio is very reliable but pretty expensive. Note that different factories have different formats for the BOM and annotation PDFs.
goodpoint 4y ago
From TFA: > A Linux system like the Pi on the other hand, is writing permanent its log files and swap partition or to the SD-card ...only if you don't know how to configured an embedded Linux.
- tracker1 4y ago
  Even then... I mostly stopped using SD on these things when I had a (other-fruit)-Pi device that would on rare ocassion (3x in under a year) just nuke the SD card's data when power was cycled... I was using it for a mini emulation box (atari, nes, etc) and just irked me to no end. Since then, SSD over USB, far more reliable, properly configured or not.

131 points by jicksaw 4y ago

I <3 ESP32, working on microcontrollers is fun and there's a decent variety of tools available. You can run Linux on one ( s l o w l y ) but running on bare metal is more fun. There's a good package ecosystem for working in C or micropython.

Taniwha 4y ago

Does it really have a ground plane directly under the antenna?

timonoko 4y ago
Does not matter. "Wifi needs an external antenna". And indeed there is typical Nokia antenna plug on top right.
- iamflimflam1 4y ago
  That’s a bit weird. The built in PCB antenna on the ESP32 is pretty good. You only generally need an external antenna for some applications. The modules with both the connector and PCB antenna normally hace a jumper resistor to switch between.
  - iamflimflam1 4y ago
    From the readme: Please notice, that the ESP32-module PCB antenna can not be used, an external wifi antenna is required. This is because of space restrictions, the RasPi form factor not allow us to make the board larger, and there is simply no space left for the required keepout area for the PCB antenna. Shame they couldn’t make it work.
    - gregwebs 4y ago
      > Because several people mention the integrated PCB antenna, the version 3.2 offer at least a basic use of the PCB antenna. Still, the external PCB antenna is the prefered way to use Wifi with the EsPiFF, now to use the integrated PCB antenna as well. Keep in mind, that the ESP32-WROVER-IB module requires a solder jumper modification before the PCB antenna can be used.
    - stavros 4y ago
      Also from the Readme: > Because several people mention the integrated PCB antenna, the version 3.2 offer at least a basic use of the PCB antenna. Still, the external PCB antenna is the prefered way to use Wifi with the EsPiFF It's nice that they removed the ground plane, it should be fairly good now.

matthews2 4y ago

> The EsPiFF V3 will bring the following > an RP2040 IO-processor additional to the ESP32 It's a shame that the RP2040 doesn't have a good low power sleep mode. Not really appropriate for battery powered applications.

dragontamer 4y ago
> RP2040 There's a lot of shame with the RP2040 in my opinion. 1. No internal oscillator. Always requires external clock. 2. No internal flash. Always requires external flash + somewhat complex startup sequence. 3. ~500uA per MHz current consumption. Much higher than competitors (ex: STM32L1 has 180uA per MHz). This is a relatively power-hungry chip both in active, and sleep, modes. ------- I think RP2040 is some kind of bridge device between the microcontroller and microprocessor worlds. But the M0+ core is an odd choice for this. Real world uCs / processors utilizing a Cortex M7 (or similar) would probably be a better idea? That being said, the ESP32 is high-power (~100mA) due to the radio. Radios always use lots of power, especially during transmit. So the RP2040 probably is fine for this use case.

gregwebs 4y ago

> While it was easy to get a (RPI) solution up and running in a short time, over time we got a lot of problems resulting from using the Pi. A key problem of the Pi's design is, to rely on an SD-card. > after some months the SD-card broke and the application crashed. High-end industrial SD-card lasted longer, but finally still broke. > So we made the decision, to build a replacement, which is focused on high-reliability, but still enable the use of Raspberry Pi universum of add-ons, like HATs and enclosures. We choose the ESP32 dual core, 2x240MHz WROVER module with 8MB PSRAM and 16MB Flash. The EsPiFF, the Esp32 in Raspberry Pi Form Factor was born. > After the EsPiFF is now mature enough, we we are preparing a campaign at Crowd Supply.

geek_at 4y ago
I try to never rely on the Pi's SD card. Either I use a system which uses RAM disk like Alpine Linux or a modified Raspbian. You can even PXE boot with later Raspberry Pi3b+ and 4 But yes, then you need network storage or USB SSDs or something
moffkalast 4y ago
They decided to design this whole thing instead of just going with a read only SD partition or one of the CM4 docks with eMMC? Don't get me wrong, the end result is really cool and if just an ESP can cover their entire use case then the Pi was definitely overkill, but it just seems like inventing a flying car because you once got a flat tire.
- cracrecry 4y ago
  We also depend on RPys. Right now the supply chain problems RPys are so big,that they are reselling RP 4s for over 300 euros!! Imagine that over night the price of cars go 3x and you have to wait a long time for them. Different people are finding different alternatives. We also created a very convoluted solution.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
    That's understandable, but has nothing to do with what the poster was saying.

andrewstuart 4y ago

Does it fit precisely into a raspberry pi case? I don’t see the TRRS audio/composite video connector. It would be good if it also had a VGA output port using USB microB. Esp32 supports these things so it would be nice to see them on this pi “clone”. You might consider the more powerful WROVER-E which has 8MB psram and 16MB flash. https://www.espressif.com/sites/default/files/documentation/esp32-wrover-e_esp32-wrover-ie_datasheet_en.pdf https://www.espressif.com/sites/default/files/documentation/... Add 2 CH599's for only $1 each and you could add 4 USB ports, like the RPi. Fit it into a genuine case then you'd pretty much have a feature match - VGA video, composite NTSC/PAL video, audio, USB ports, sdcard.

timonoko 4y ago

"All I want for Christmas is SD-card reader on my ESP32." - Finds micropython library. Ok. - Finds schematics for physical connection. Ok "But where do I find that fiddly SD-card bracket?" - Opens a drawer, sees a mound of useless MicroSD-adaptors. Ok.

timonoko 4y ago
That was easy -- eventually. One only has to believe what the micropython manual says and not watch any instructables-videos. >>> os.mount(machine.SDCard(slot=2),"/sd") >>> os.listdir('/sd') ['DCIM', 'VIDEO', 'PHOTO']
- timonoko 4y ago
  Using SD-card on ESP8266 was more challenging. upip.install('sdcard') did not work. But ChatGPT truly helped and suggested I find it in Github. https://github.com/micropython/micropython-lib/blob/master/micropython/drivers/storage/sdcard/sdcard.py https://github.com/micropython/micropython-lib/blob/master/m...
dvh 4y ago
Esp32-cam has sdcard reader

kkielhofner 4y ago

I love seeing more ESP32 based projects and hardware. It’s a remarkably capable platform with a robust ecosystem that for a “microcontroller” somewhat resembles that of the Raspberry Pi. I have an irrational frustration when I see people doing simple GPIO, etc with a Raspberry Pi 4 (when you used to be able to get them). I mean come on people, it has four cores, gigabytes of RAM, and can drive two 4k displays(at 30Hz) and you’re using a pin?!? The Raspberry Pi has relatively low power consumption compared to what most people are used to with anything x86 but an ESP32 based solution comes in at 1/10 the power consumption (or less), a fraction of the cost, and you can actually get them these days. Then I calm myself down when I remember GPIO on a Raspberry Pi is following one of the 100,000 guides that’s been written on the topic and can be done in a comfortable, standard Linux environment with a few lines of python (or whatever). Question for this project - does anyone know the specific regulatory issues of a “commercial” product that calls for an external WiFi antenna? From my little understanding on the topic it seems that ERP, etc could pose a regulatory issue although I think there are exceptions for low scale/hobby products.

epx 4y ago
Wish there was an ESP64 with just enough RAM to run a Debian distro, even slowly, so we could stop waiting for Zeros to get cheaper.
- squarefoot 4y ago
  You can run Armbian and DietPI (both Debian derivatives) on most small boards; some like the NanoPI NEO are in the same price ballpark as the Pi Zero, but are in stock. https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=69&product_id=132 https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product/product... https://www.armbian.com/download/?device_support=Supported https://www.armbian.com/download/?device_support=Supported https://dietpi.com/#download https://dietpi.com/#download
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  BeagleBone has always been an option. The cool kids just choose to ignore it.

pmontra 4y ago

> writing permanent its log files and swap partition If this is the problem, the solutions are no swap and log2ram https://github.com/azlux/log2ram https://github.com/azlux/log2ram I also noticed that Armbian logs to a ramdisk. I didn't investigate the implementation and if its contents survive a reboot. The only real problems for me are that the SD card will eventually fail no matter what (I mean, much sooner than a SDD or HDD) and that there are basically no Pis at sale at a reasonable price. As a platform it is nearly dead.

jccooper 4y ago
They also have a built-in ramdisk overlay, which basically solves the problem (so long as you don't need persistence!)
- jbuzbee 4y ago
  I use this in a little raspberry pi project. For persistence, I occasionally copy data to a writable partition and then at boot, after the ram overlay is mounted, I copy it back.
sneak 4y ago
This seems like a bug in the SSD firmware? I should be able to write zillions of times to the same logical sector, they don't map 1:1 to physical blocks on the flash. I've also run tons of RPis off of SSD root and never had this problem. I hear about it constantly though, so maybe it's urban legend?
tracker1 4y ago
I have mostly relied on SSD over USB for my RPi stuff, which takes up more space... With the price hikes on RPi 8GB, I've started just getting the small intel boxes N5000/6000 series mostly, since the cost became not much different than RPi + encloser + power anyway. Thinking about trying to sell my 3x RPi 4b 8gb in DeskPi cases with ~480gb ssds while prices are still pretty inflated.

nevi-me 4y ago

How does one get PCBs with all the components wired in? I've been prototyping for a while, and it would be great for me to learn how to start putting stuff in cases instead of having wires dangling around. I was looking at PBCWay just yesterday, and the process is unclear. If I say that I need some parts, do I have to source them, or can PCBWay/alternative do so for me? EDIT: what software does one use to draw PCBs for production too? I've seen a few options online, perhaps a better question is what preferences there are. One thing I'm curious about is whether that software will say "you need this much resistance between these 2 components".

sebazzz 4y ago
I’m also curious how people come from the level “I know C, C++, Arduino, I understand what capacitors, resistors, transitors and diodes do” to the level of “I can integrate a 3.3V Arduino Nano with 5V or more circruitry with logic level shifters, I know when to use certain capacitor types, understand when inrush current conditions can happen, etc”. And I mean just for hobby. Not interested in anything pro.
- jnovek 4y ago
  I’m also a hobbyist and I think it’s just slow and incremental. This year I decided to expand my electronics hobby into synth stuff. I was by no means prepared for this, but after a year of studying various synth module circuits I’m starting recognize certain patterns when I look at a schematic. Perhaps the hardest part of this process was learning enough to start asking good questions. Everything has gotten so much easier in the last 2 or 3 months because I’ve finally built enough confidence, knowledge and intuition to ask my EE friends why something was designed a certain way. I’ve also learned that they are often equally puzzled. :-) I think it helps if you have a project you’re working towards.
bonzini 4y ago
The PCB can be prepared with KiCad or Eagle for example. Then you do a lot of preparation work. You have to prepare the bill of materials, be super careful about the annotation layers on the PCB to prepare a PDF of the components. Finally you pay. :) PCB assembly services exist from various places, for example Seeedstudio is very reliable but pretty expensive. Note that different factories have different formats for the BOM and annotation PDFs.

goodpoint 4y ago

From TFA: > A Linux system like the Pi on the other hand, is writing permanent its log files and swap partition or to the SD-card ...only if you don't know how to configured an embedded Linux.

tracker1 4y ago
Even then... I mostly stopped using SD on these things when I had a (other-fruit)-Pi device that would on rare ocassion (3x in under a year) just nuke the SD card's data when power was cycled... I was using it for a mini emulation box (atari, nes, etc) and just irked me to no end. Since then, SSD over USB, far more reliable, properly configured or not.