Cytron CM4 Maker Board review – Part 2: NVMe SSD, RTC, Buzzer, Grove modules, ChatGPT…

Cytron CM4 Maker board Review

We’ve already checked out Cytron’s CM4 Maker Board kit with a Raspberry Pi CM4 system-on-module and booted the system with the included 32GB “MAKERDISK” Class 10 microSD card preloaded Raspberry Pi OS in the first part of the review. For the second part of the CM4 Maker review, I’ve mostly used the 128GB NVMe SSD provided by the company and played with other features of the board including the RTC, the buzzer, some Seeed Studio grove modules, and even got help from ChatGPT for one of the Python programs I used. Booting Cytron CM4 Maker Board with the “MAKERDISK” NVMe SSD I connected several Grove modules with GPIO and I2C interfaces, a Raspberry Pi Camera Module 3, an Ethernet cable, two RF dongles for a wireless keyboard and mouse, an HDMI cable to a monitor, and finally inserted the provided 5V/3.5A USB-C power adapter. The MAKERDISK SSD comes with Raspberry […]

PiEEG shield for Raspberry Pi enables brain computer interfaces (Crowdfunding)

PiEEG Shield Raspberry Pi BCI

PiEEG is an open-source hardware Raspberry Pi shield that measures electroencephalography (EEG), electromyography (EMG), and electrocardiography (ECG) bio-signals and provides a brain-computer interface to applications or robots for gaming, entertainment, sports, health, etc… Ildar Rakhmatulin, a Research Associate at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, is passionate about open-source brain-computer interfaces and first created the IronBCI project based on ADS1299 and STM32 and published a research paper entitled “Low-cost brain computer interface for everyday use” about his work. But cost increases related to the semiconductors shortage of recent years meant the price for his “low-cost” project shot up to over $1,000. So he went back to the drawing board and created the PiEEG shield for Raspberry Pi now available on Crowd Supply. PiEEG shield specifications: ADC – Texas Instruments ADS1299 Analog-to-Digital Converter for biopotential measurements Supported SBCs – Raspberry Pi 3 or 4, and boards with the same 40-pin GPIO header. Host […]

FOSSBot open design 3D printed educational robot is made with Raspberry Pi and off-the-shelf parts

DIY open design robot Raspberry Pi SBC

FOSSBot is an “open design” 3D printed educational robot comprised of a Raspberry Pi SBC and various off-the-shelf modules, as well as open-source software that can be used for education purposes. The FOSSBot DIY robot has been developed by the Harokopio University of Athens and the Greek Free and Open Source Software (GFOSS) community, and builds upon the “GSOC 2019 – A DIY robot kit for educators” with the main goal being to have a platform to “familiarize teachers with modern education models based on the S.T.E.A.M approach. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics)”. FOSSbot key components: SBC – Raspberry Pi Zero W, Raspberry Pi 3, or Raspberry Pi 4. Mechanically and electrically compatible Raspberry Pi alternatives could be an option too although part of the software would have to be modified Storage – 32GB MicroSD card Expansion board – Adafruit Perma-Proto HAT for Pi – No EEPROM to connect sensors […]

XGO 2 – A Raspberry Pi CM4 based robot dog with an arm (Crowdfunding)

XGO 2 robot dog with arm

XGO 2 is a desktop robot dog using the Raspberry Pi CM4 as its brain, the ESP32 as the motor controller for the four legs and an additional robotic arm that allows the quadruped robot to grab objects. An evolution of the XGO mini robot dog with a Kendryte K210 RISC-V AI processor, the XGO 2 robot offers 12 degrees of freedom and the more powerful Raspberry CM4 model enables faster AI edge computing applications, as well as features such as omnidirectional movement, six-dimensional posture control, posture stability, and multiple motion gaits. The XGO 2 robot dog is offered in two variants – the XGO-Lite 2 and the XGO-Mini 2 – with the following key features and specifications: The company also says the new robot can provide feedback on its own postures thanks to its 6-axis IMU and sensors for the joints reporting the position and electric current. A display […]

ultraArm P340 Arduino-based robotic arm draws, engraves, and grabs

ultraArm P340 robotic arm draw engrave grabber

Elephant Robotics ultraArm P340 is a robot arm with an Arduino-compatible ATMega2560 control board with a 340mm working radius whose arm can be attached with different accessories for drawing, laser engraving, and grabbing objects. We’ve previously written and reviewed the myCobot 280 Pi robotic arm with a built-in Raspberry Pi 4 SBC, but the lower-cost ultraArm P340 works a little differently since it only contains the electronics for controlling the servos and attachments, and needs to be connected to a host computer running Windows or a Raspberry Pi over USB. ultraArm P340 specifications: Control board based on Microchip ATMega2560 8-bit AVR microcontroller @ 16MHz with 256KB flash, 4Kb EEPROM, 8KB SRAM DOF – 3 to 4 axis depending on accessories Working radius – 340mm Positioning Accuracy – ±0.1 mm Payload – Up to 650 grams High-performance stepper motor Maximum speed – 100mm/s Communication interfaces – RS485 and USB serial Attachment […]

Sipeed M1s & M0sense – Low-cost BL808 & BL702 based AI modules (Crowdfunding)

Sipeed M1s & M0Sense

Sipeed has launched the M1s and M0Sense AI modules. Designed for AIoT application, the Sipeed M1s is based on the Bouffalo Lab BL808 32-bit/64-bit RISC-V wireless SoC with WiFi, Bluetooth, and an 802.15.4 radio for Zigbee support, as well as the BLAI-100 (Bouffalo Lab AI engine) NPU for video/audio detection and/or recognition. The Sipeed M0Sense targets TinyML applications with the Bouffa Lab BL702 32-bit microcontroller also offering WiFi, BLE, and Zigbee connectivity. Sipeed M1s AIoT module The Sipeed M1S is an update to the Kendryte K210-powered Sipeed M1 introduced several years ago. Sipeed M1s module specifications: SoC – Bouffalo Lab BL808 with CPU Alibaba T-head C906 64-bit RISC-V (RV64GCV+) core @ 480MHz Alibaba T-head E907 32-bit RISC-V (RV32GCP+) core @ 320MHz 32-bit RISC-V (RV32EMC) core @ 160 MHz Memory – 768KB SRAM and 64MB embedded PSRAM AI accelerator – NPU BLAI-100 (Bouffalo Lab AI engine) for video/audio detection/recognition delivering up […]

Review of myCobot 280 Pi robotic arm with Python and visual programming

myCobot 280 Pi Conveyor Color Sorting

myCobot 280 Pi is a versatile robotic arm with a 6 degree of freedom design. It was developed by Elephant Robotics using the Raspberry Pi 4 board as the main controller. The robot is compact and delivers stable operation making it ideal for confined spaces. It can also be programmed in a variety of languages, is easy to use, and offers a lot of features. It is suitable for those who are interested in learning how to program a robotic arm controller and for engineering projects. Unboxing myCobot 280 Pi The myCobot 280 Pi arm has a working range of 280 mm, weighs 850 grams, and can handle a payload of up to 250 grams. It is powered by 6 servo motors, one for each degree of freedom, and comes with a 5×5 matrix LED display, and supports LEGO parts as well. Controlled by a Raspberry Pi 4 single board […]

Easily add face detection to your project with the Person Sensor module

Person Sensor

It’s now much easier to AI features to your project thanks to better tools, but as we’ve experienced when trying out Edge Impulse machine learning platform on the XIAO BLE Sense board, it still requires some effort and the learning curve may be higher than some expect. But for common tasks like face detection, there’s no reason for the solution to be hard-to-use or expensive, and Pete Warden (Useful Sensors) has designed the $10 Person Sensor fitted with a camera module pre-programmed with algorithms that detect nearby faces and reports the results over an I2C interface.   Person Sensor specifications: ASIC – Himax HX6537-A ultra-low-power AI accelerator @ 400 MHz with 2MB SRAM, 2MB flash Camera Image Sensor – 110 degrees FOV Image scan rate – 7Hz with no facial recognition Image scan rate – 5Hz with facial recognition active Host interface Qwiic connector for the I2C interface up to […]

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