4 ms·

Ok. So then it's just on par with an ESP32...later this year possibly.

bschwindHN 2y ago
Its advantage over ESP32 is the flexibility in its PIO peripheral, I'd say. That, and it's super well documented and easy to get code running on it. ESP32 is a great complement to it though for projects needing wifi or BLE
ssl-3 2y ago
Not exactly, no. The ESP32 is a fine series of MCUs, but it doesn't have PIOs, a choice between ARM and RISC-V (or both!), 5v-tolerant IO -- to name a few things that this new RP2350 provides. There's a ton of stuff in the world that uses an MCU and doesn't have wireless, and that would not benefit from having wireless. But if RP2350 features and wireless are both necessary today, then nothing but a few schekels and some space on the board stops anyone from integrating those things. One can have both. Remember, even the ESP8266 was first seen in English-speaking DIY circles as just a way to add wifi to things like Arduino projects and not so much as a capable, programmable MCU itself. https://hackaday.com/2014/08/26/new-chip-alert-the-esp8266-wifi-module-its-5/ https://hackaday.com/2014/08/26/new-chip-alert-the-esp8266-w...
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- AnotherGoodName 2y ago
  There’s multiple people saying this so I’ll just ask politely. Every esp has a multitude of gpios. The esp8266 mentioned is almost entirely gpios on its pin out. I’ve used these extensively and it’s great for flexibility. From led indicators to full on activating a relay. You say it’s not the same as the pi’s pios. So I’ll ask. What does the pi do here that the esp doesn’t?
  - AnotherGoodName 2y ago
    In fact looking further the pi and the esps have very similar pin outs with regard to gpio functionality? Are people in this thread just misguided in saying the esp doesn’t have Pio or am I missing something?
    - ecjhdnc2025 2y ago
      (I am very much not an expert) You're missing something but it's actually easy to get confused about. GPIO: general purpose input/output. A pin that can be used by the main CPU core(s) to interrogate the outside world. PIO: programmable input-output. A small, I/O dedicated state-machine that can be custom-programmed in a minimal assembly language to handle I/O tasks/simple protocols/state management, over GPIO/I2C/SPI etc., without taxing the primary CPU. https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://tutoduino.fr/en/pio-rp2040-en/ https://tutoduino.fr/en/pio-rp2040-en/ Some microcontrollers have basic features a little similar, but it's something the RP series is taking a lot more seriously than most. The RP2040 has eight of these PIO state machines; the RP2350 has 12. There are some astonishing examples of what these things can do. But basically think of these as delegated GPIO/SPI/I2C etc. co-processors that can blaze away at high speeds on I/O tasks without needing the main cores until something "high-level" occurs.
      - AnotherGoodName 2y ago
        Makes sense. I’ve worked a lot with multipurpose gpio that can also be configured as spi or i2c but this is another step beyond that. Thanks to everyone for this!
  - coder543 2y ago
    PIO is not the same as GPIO: https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ The PIOs are state machines that let you develop custom peripherals that run asynchronously, not taking up CPU time. You could probably bitbang some custom peripherals on an ESP32/ESP8266, but that takes up a lot of CPU time and power.
  - 2y ago

Its advantage over ESP32 is the flexibility in its PIO peripheral, I'd say. That, and it's super well documented and easy to get code running on it. ESP32 is a great complement to it though for projects needing wifi or BLE

ssl-3 2y ago

Not exactly, no. The ESP32 is a fine series of MCUs, but it doesn't have PIOs, a choice between ARM and RISC-V (or both!), 5v-tolerant IO -- to name a few things that this new RP2350 provides. There's a ton of stuff in the world that uses an MCU and doesn't have wireless, and that would not benefit from having wireless. But if RP2350 features and wireless are both necessary today, then nothing but a few schekels and some space on the board stops anyone from integrating those things. One can have both. Remember, even the ESP8266 was first seen in English-speaking DIY circles as just a way to add wifi to things like Arduino projects and not so much as a capable, programmable MCU itself. https://hackaday.com/2014/08/26/new-chip-alert-the-esp8266-wifi-module-its-5/ https://hackaday.com/2014/08/26/new-chip-alert-the-esp8266-w...

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
AnotherGoodName 2y ago
There’s multiple people saying this so I’ll just ask politely. Every esp has a multitude of gpios. The esp8266 mentioned is almost entirely gpios on its pin out. I’ve used these extensively and it’s great for flexibility. From led indicators to full on activating a relay. You say it’s not the same as the pi’s pios. So I’ll ask. What does the pi do here that the esp doesn’t?
- AnotherGoodName 2y ago
  In fact looking further the pi and the esps have very similar pin outs with regard to gpio functionality? Are people in this thread just misguided in saying the esp doesn’t have Pio or am I missing something?
  - ecjhdnc2025 2y ago
    (I am very much not an expert) You're missing something but it's actually easy to get confused about. GPIO: general purpose input/output. A pin that can be used by the main CPU core(s) to interrogate the outside world. PIO: programmable input-output. A small, I/O dedicated state-machine that can be custom-programmed in a minimal assembly language to handle I/O tasks/simple protocols/state management, over GPIO/I2C/SPI etc., without taxing the primary CPU. https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://tutoduino.fr/en/pio-rp2040-en/ https://tutoduino.fr/en/pio-rp2040-en/ Some microcontrollers have basic features a little similar, but it's something the RP series is taking a lot more seriously than most. The RP2040 has eight of these PIO state machines; the RP2350 has 12. There are some astonishing examples of what these things can do. But basically think of these as delegated GPIO/SPI/I2C etc. co-processors that can blaze away at high speeds on I/O tasks without needing the main cores until something "high-level" occurs.
    - AnotherGoodName 2y ago
      Makes sense. I’ve worked a lot with multipurpose gpio that can also be configured as spi or i2c but this is another step beyond that. Thanks to everyone for this!
- coder543 2y ago
  PIO is not the same as GPIO: https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/what-is-pio/ The PIOs are state machines that let you develop custom peripherals that run asynchronously, not taking up CPU time. You could probably bitbang some custom peripherals on an ESP32/ESP8266, but that takes up a lot of CPU time and power.
- 2y ago