bluetooth News - CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

July 26, 2024July 26, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

T2-U WiFi and Bluetooth development board supports the Tuya Smart Home framework

The T2-U is a development board compatible with the Tuya Smart Home framework that features a WiFi and Bluetooth module with a 120 MHz RISC processor, some buttons, an LED indicator, GPIOs, power, and a USB-to-serial chip. In 2019, we covered Tuya as a one-stop Smart Home solution allowing companies to easily design and manufacture home automation devices from electronics to the enclosure. For example, the company provides a customizable 4-inch Android touch control panel & Zigbee gateway as well as the Tuya Link SDK allowing customers to further customize the firmware of their Smart Home devices, but I had yet to see a development board compatible with Tuya. T2-U development board specifications: Wireless module – T2-U SoC – Unnamed 32-bit RISC MCU @ 120 MHz with 2 MB flash and 256 KB RAM Wireless Wi-Fi 802.11b, 802.11g, and 802.11n wireless standard. Channels 1 to 14 at 2.4 GHz. Security […]

July 24, 2024July 24, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

LILYGO T-Halow is an ESP32-S3 board with long-range WiFi HaLoW, OV2640/OV5640 camera support

LILYGO T-Halow is an ESP32-S3 board equipped with a WiFi HaLow module with up to 1.2km range, a connector compatible with OV2640 and OV5640 camera modules, and an 18650 battery holder for power, as well as several GPIOs for expansion. We first wrote about 802.11ah low-power long-range WiFi standard operating at 900 MHz in 2014, but adoption has been slow and we’ve seen a few 802.11ah (WiFi HaLow) chips from Newracom and Morse Micro over the years, as well as USB adapters, a Raspberry Pi HAT, a mini PCIe card, gateways, and some development boards. All those rely on a Linux host, but the LILYGO T-Halow features a TX-AH WiFI HaLow module from Taixin Semiconductor that’s controller by AT commands through an ESP32-S3 or a micro USB port. LILYGO T-Halow specifications: Wireless modules ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 wireless module SoC – ESP32-S3 dual-core Tensilica LX7 microcontroller @ up to 240 MHz with 2.4 […]

July 24, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Remote.It adds Bluetooth assisted WiFi configuration to Raspberry Pi SBC’s

Remote.It, a company providing remote access services, has released an open-source project to enable Raspberry Pi WiFi network configuration using Bluetooth (BLE), so users can easily configure WiFi on the board by simply using their smartphone. Configuring WiFi on a Raspberry Pi usually involves either: Manual configuration – The user connects a monitor and keyboard to the Raspberry Pi to configure the wireless network directly on the device. Pre-configured SD cards, NVMe SSDs, or USB drives – The WiFi ESSID and password can be set in Raspberry Pi USB imager, and the Raspberry Pi will automatically connect to the network at boot time. That’s quick, but less flexible since the credentials can’t be modified after deployment, and it only works when using a single wireless network. Remote.It offers a third option for WiFi provisioning using Bluetooth LE. The Raspberry Pi can run headless or fully enclosed into a product, and […]

July 20, 2024July 23, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments

The Blette Stick relies on Bluetooth 5.0 LE for off-grid messaging with up to 1.1km range

Blette Stick Bluetooth LE offgrid communication

The Blette Stick is a Bluetooth 5.0 LE USB-C dongle designed to be attached to an Android smartphone in order to provide off-grid messaging and GPS coordinates sharing capabilities with a range of up to 1.1km in case WiFi and cellular networks are down. CNX Software readers may also be familiar with Meshtastic devices relying on WiFi to connect to the smartphone with Bluetooth and to other nodes using LoRaWAN to enable off-grid messaging while trekking or during emergencies. The Blettle Stick does something similar to the Meshtastic project but with Bluetooth LE long-range communication instead of Bluetooth+LoRaWAN. While the range will be shorter and limited to around 1km (line-of-sight), the plug-and-play design will make it easier to use for typical users who are not technically savvy. Blettle Stick specifications: SoC – Nordic Semi nRF52 Bluetooth 5.0 LE microcontroller (exact part number not specified, possibly nRF52840) Wireless – Bluetooth 5.0 […]

July 19, 2024July 19, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

How to easily enable MediaTek MT7922 Bluetooth on Ubuntu 24.04

MediaTek MT7922 WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.3 modules have recently been found in several mini PCs, but Bluetooth would not work in Linux due to a lack of drivers. In this post, we’ll show how to easily enable Bluetooth in MediaTek MT7922 modules when running Ubuntu 24.04. We previously noted that Ian Morrisson submitted a patch adding the IDs for the MT7922 module (Azurewave AW-XB591NF) used in recent GEEKOM mini PCs last March. In theory, you could have rebuilt the Linux kernel, but now that Linux 6.10 has been released, it’s much easier since Canonical has made the Linux 6.10 kernel available for Ubuntu, so we only need to install it and problem solved! Ubuntu 24.04 ships with Linux 6.8, we can see a Bluetooth opcode error in the kernel log.

July 17, 2024July 17, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

StackyFi ESP32-S3 board features camera connector, 40-pin GPIO header for Raspberry Pi HAT (Crowdfunding)

StackyFi ESP32-S3 Raspberry Pi Zero board

SB Components’ StackyFi is an ESP32-S3 WiFi and Bluetooth IoT board with a 40-pin GPIO header compatible with most Raspberry Pi HAT expansion boards and a camera connector for image capture to a microSD card or machine learning applications. The Raspberry Pi Zero-sized board also comes with two USB Type-C ports, one “native” and the other for serial debugging, an IMU sensor, an RGB LED, and Boot and Reset buttons. The board can be powered through one of the USB-C ports or a LiPo battery. It partially builds upon the earlier StackPi board with a Raspberry Pi RP2040 microcontroller. StackyFi specifications: Wireless module – ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 MCU – ESP32-S3 dual-core Tensilica LX7 up to 240 MHz with 512KB SRAM Memory – TBD PSRAM Storage – TBD flash Wireless – WiFi 4 and Bluetooth LE 5 PCB antenna Storage – MicroSD card Camera I/F – FPC connector that works with OV2640 camera […]

July 16, 2024July 15, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments

SparkFun RTK EVK offers GNSS with centimeter accuracy, WiFi, Bluetooth, 4G LTE Cat 1, and Ethernet connectivity

SparkFun RTK EVK is a fully-enclosed GNSS platform designed for fixed or mobile high-precision positioning and navigation applications with centimeter accuracy thanks to RTK (real-time kinematic) technology implemented with modules from u-blox. About two months ago, Sparkfun introduced the RTK Torch waterproof GNSS surveyor with Unicore UM980 GNSS module with RTK support, ESP32 for WiFi/Bluetooth, and an STM32WLE5C LoRa SoC. The SparkFun RTK EVK (evaluation kit) may drop LoRa connectivity, but it’s a more versatile platform with WiFi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, and LTE Cat 1 cellular connectivity, besides support for L1 + L2 RTK GNSS with L-Band correction. Sparkfun RTK EVK specifications: GNSS Receiver – u-blox ZED-F9P Concurrent reception of GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, and BeiDou Receives both L1C/A and L2C bands 184-channel u-blox F9 engine Time to First Fix: 25s (cold), 2s (hot) Max Navigation Rate: 20Hz / 25Hz depending on mode Horizontal Position Accuracy: 2.5m without RTK; 0.010m with RTK […]

July 15, 2024July 16, 2024 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Linux 6.10 Release – Notable changes, Arm, RISC-V, and MIPS architectures

Linux Torvalds has announced the release of Linux 6.10 on LKML: So the final week was perhaps not quote as quiet as the preceding ones, which I don’t love – but it also wasn’t noisy enough to warrant an extra rc. And much of the noise this last week was bcachefs again (with netfs a close second), so it was all pretty compartmentalized. In fact, about a third of the patch for the last week was filesystem-related (there were also some btrfs latency fixes and other noise), which is unusual, but none of it looks particularly scary. Another third was drivers, and the rest is “random”. Anyway, this obviously means that the merge window for 6.11 opens up tomorrow. Let’s see how that goes, with much of Europe probably making ready for summer vacation. And the shortlog below is – as always – just the last week, not some kind […]