The new and tiny Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect is wireless, has a built-in microphone and a Raspberry Pico chip

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Originally published at: The new and tiny Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect is wireless, has a built-in microphone and a Raspberry Pico chip | Boing Boing

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That is a lot of money for such a weak board. ESP32 boards are way better and way cheaper–also supported by the same IDE as the Arduino boards.

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Actually, the WiFi chip on this board IS a Esp32 connected via SPI. History is repeating itself. Esp8266 was used as WiFi bridge for Arduino before people realized that the WiFi chip was a more powerful chip than the chip it was connected to.

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I saw it was a u-Blox module and didn’t realize that they were useing ESP32 chips. They usually don’t use other people’s chips. Let alone toute them as open which they do for this design. How interesting that is! Well done u-Blox!

But, you’re exactly right, that just makes the idea of slaving a superior chip to a Pico an even dumber idea.

If there’s anyone who can do something dumber and more NIH than Arduino, it’s the RP Foundation.

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Then again, this IS a Arduino board, it was their decision, so it’s on them, not RPF. I think the RP2040 has its own place. It is cheaper than a ESP32 board, has less powerdraw, and it’s state machines can be useful.

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Wait, what’s cheaper than an ESP32 board? They’re $4 to $5 for a ESP32 dev board. The bare modules are cheaper.

My point may have seemed backwards. Given that it’s Arduino who used an RPF chip and an ESP32 where an ESP32 alone would have done a better job.

The state machines of the pico are still a solution in search of a problem. I’ve not seen a comparison of the power draw between the ESP32 and the pico doing similar tasks–that both are capable of. Given that the ESP32 can do Wifi and BT and the pico cannot, that Venn diagram is mostly a big circle of the ESP32 almost completely enclosing a smaller circle which is the pico. I’m curiout if that little pico part that’s not inside of the ESP32 makes up for the 4 to 5x price increase of the pico.

Given that the board we’re considering here has both chips, it really depends on that little are being worthwhile. I’m not seeing it–certainly not for the price.

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