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August 8, 2026August 8, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments

LILYGO T-Echo Card – A weatherproof, solar-powered, nRF52840-based LoRa + GPS development kit

LILYGO T-Echo Card is a thin development kit based on Nordic Semi nRF52840 wireless MCU and a Semtech SX1262 LoRa transceiver with a solar panel for charging an 800 mAh battery. It supports Bluetooth 5, NFC, Bluetooth Mesh, ANT, 802.15.4 (Zigbee/Thread), LoRaWAN, and GNSS (L76K module) connectivity. The board also features a 0.42-inch OLED information display, a magnetic USB interface, a 9-axis motion sensor, a digital microphone, a speaker, and an RGB LED for status/notifications. It’s mainly useful for off-grid communication (text and audio), GNSS location sharing, personal/asset tracking, and as a compact mesh network node. T-Echo Card specifications: SoC – Nordic Semiconductor nRF52840 CPU – 32-bit Arm Cortex-M4F microcontroller @ 64 MHz Memory/Storage – 1 MB Flash, 256 KB RAM Wireless – Bluetooth 5, NFC, Bluetooth Mesh, 802.15.4 (Zigbee/Thread), ANT, 2.4 GHz proprietary Storage – 32 Mbit SPI flash (ZD25WQ32CEIGR) LoRa transceiver – Semtech SX1262 with global coverage support: […]

July 31, 2026August 2, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

Maker Go ESP32-C5-EVB board features RS-485 interface, four relays, four opto-isolated inputs

Maker Go ESP32-C5-EVB is an ESP32-C5 board with four relays, four opto-isolated inputs, RS-485 communication, and support for Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth Low Energy 5.0, and Thread/Zigbee connectivity. It’s a variant of the Maker Go ESP32-C6-EVB released in 2024 that replaces the ESP32-C6 module with an ESP32-C5 module and a GPIO header with a terminal block for RS-485. The Maker Go ESP32-C6-EVB was mostly a clone of the Olimex ESP32-C6-EVB, and while Olimex already released its own ESP32-C5-EVB, it has a different dual-channel relay design. Maker Go ESP32-C5-EVB specifications: Wireless module – DOIT ESPC5-32 module SoC – Espressif Systems ESP32-C5 CPU Single-core 32-bit RISC-V processor @ up to 240 MHz Low-power RISC-V core @ 40 MHz acting as the main processor for power-sensitive applications Memory – 384 KB SRAM on-chip, support for external PSRAM Storage – 320 KB ROM, support for external flash Connectivity Dual-band 802.11ax WiFi 6 in the 2.4GHz […]

July 28, 2026July 28, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

LILYGO T-Display C5 board features 1.9-inch IPS color LCD, battery support, Qwiic expansion connectors

LILYGO T-Display C5 is an ESP32-C5 board with a 1.9-inch IPS color LCD, a USB-C port for power and programming, Lithium battery support, and GPIO expansion via headers and two Qwiic expansion connectors. The main benefit of using an ESP32-C5 chip is support for dual-band WiFi 6 connectivity (2.4/5.0 GHz), and it also keeps Bluetooth LE 5.x and the 802.15.4 radio for Zigbee/Thread/Matter found in the ESP32-C6. LILYGO T-Display C5 specifications: Wireless module – Espressif Systems ESP32-WROOM-C5-1U-N16R8 SoC – ESP32-C5HR8 CPU Single-core 32-bit RISC-V processor @ up to 240 MHz Low-power RISC-V core @ 40 MHz acting as the main processor for power-sensitive applications Memory – 384 KB SRAM on-chip, 8MB PSRAM Storage – 320 KB ROM Wireless Connectivity Dual-band (2.4GHz/5 GHz) 802.11ax WiFi 6, with 802.11b/g/n WiFi 4 standard fallback Bluetooth 5.0 Low Energy (LE) 802.15.4 radio for Zigbee 3.0 and Thread 1.3 Storage – 16MB flash Antenna – […]

July 23, 2026July 23, 2026 by Debashis Das - No Comments

Icy Electronics nRF54L15 Discovery devboard integrates a snappable nRF52820 CMSIS-DAP debugger

nRF54L15 Discovery Devboard (+ nRF52820 CMSIS DAP)

The nRF54L15 Discovery is a compact wireless devboard with an onboard nRF52820 CMSIS-DAP debugger/programmer for Bluetooth LE, Thread, Zigbee, Matter, NFC, and other 2.4 GHz IoT applications. Its snap-apart design allows the target and interface MCUs to be used as two standalone boards. In the past, we have written about various development boards based on the Nordic nRF54L series, including the Seeed Studio XIAO nRF54L15, XIAO nRF54LM20A (Sense), and the nRF54L15 Connect Kit. The nRF54L15 Discovery board further integrates a snappable nRF52820 CMSIS-DAP debugger/programmer section. It also includes an nPM1300 PMIC with 32–800 mA LiPo battery charging and USB-C PD support, along with a TPS63900 buck-boost converter configurable for 1.8V or 3.3V I/O operation. nRF54L15 Discovery specifications: Wireless MCU – Nordic Semi nRF54L15 wireless SoC CPU Arm Cortex-M33 @ up to 128 MHz RISC-V coprocessor for “software-defined peripheral” Memory – 256 KB SRAM Storage – 1.5MB Non-volatile Memory (NVM) Wireless Bluetooth […]

July 20, 2026 by Debashis Das - No Comments

Globalscale Case8 – A MediaTek Genio 520/720 cyberdeck for gaming, home automation, and education (Crowdfunding)

Case8 Platfrom with gaming, home automation, and education variants

Globalscale Technologies has launched the Case8 series of open-source cyberdeck-style computing platforms based on MediaTek Genio 520 and Genio 720 processors. The platform is offered in hacker (PCBA only), gaming, home automation, and education variants. The Case8 is built around an OSM-L compute module with a MediaTek Genio 520 or Genio 720 SoC with up to eight cores, a Mali-G67 GPU, and a 10 TOPS NPU. Depending on the configuration, it comes with 4GB, 8GB, or 16GB LPDDR5 memory and 64GB or 128GB UFS storage, along with Gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.4, stereo speakers, microphones, and optional 4G/5G connectivity. Display options include a 5-inch panel for the gaming model and 7-inch touch or non-touch displays for the home automation and education variants, with camera configurations varying by model. Case8 cyberdeck platform specifications: OSM-L compute module (one or the other) MediaTek Genio 520 CPU – 2x Cortex-A78 up to 2.2GHz, 6x […]

July 17, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Espressif releases SDK for Aliro smart door locks based on ESP32-C or ESP32-H SoCs

Espressif Systems has just released the SDK for Aliro, designed for smart Matter door locks and other access control solutions built around ESP32-C (WiFi) or ESP32-H (Thread) microcontroller and third-party NFC chips. We recently wrote about the Aliro vendor-agnostic digital access control standard working over NFC, Bluetooth LE, or BLE+UWB. It’s basically the equivalent of Matter, but for smart locks, instead of the broader Smart Home ecosystem. The ultimate goal is to reduce fragmentation and allow users to use compliant wallets from Google, Apple, Samsung, and others to work with Aliro-compatible devices. Espressif’s SDK for Aliro (ESP-Aliro) currently supports the following features of Aliro-over-NFC: Standard Expedited Phase Fast Expedited Phase Reader Certificate Sending via AUTH1/LoadCert Command Keyslot to Look up Access Credential Public Key Mailbox of Exchange command Step-up Phase Espressif’s solution currently only works with Aliro NFC for tap-to-unlock applications, although Bluetooth LE and Bluetooth LE + UWB support […]

July 10, 2026July 10, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 11 Comments

M5Stack Stamp-C5 – A Tiny ESP32-C5 USB-C board/module with up to 19 GPIO, 3.7V battery support

M5Stack Stamp-C5, also known as the M5Stamp-C5, is a tiny wireless IoT USB-C board based on the Espressif ESP32-C5 RISC-V microcontroller with dual-band WiFi 6, Bluetooth LE, and 802.15.4 (Zigbee/Thread) connectivity. Despite its small size (19.1 x 17.6mm), the module exposes up to nineteen GPIO pins, eleven on standard 2.54mm pitch headers and castellated holes, and eight on an FPC extension connector. The board also supports battery charging and ships with an external IPEX antenna for wireless connectivity, since there’s no built-in antenna. M5Stack Stamp-C5 specifications: Wireless MCU – Espressif Systems ESP32-C5HF4 CPU Single-core 32-bit RISC-V processor @ up to 240 MHz Low-power RISC-V core @ 48 MHz acting as the main processor for power-sensitive applications Memory – 384 KB SRAM on-chip Storage – 320 KB ROM, 4MB SPI flash Wireless Dual-band (2.4/5 GHz) 802.11ax WiFi 6, 802.11b/g/n WiFi 4 backward compatibility WiFi modes: Station mode, SoftAP mode, SoftAP + […]

July 7, 2026July 7, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

ESP32-C5 devkit offers 2.8-inch capacitive touch display, dual-band Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5 LE, LiPo battery support

Last week, I wrote about the ESP32-C5-LCD-1.47 as one of the first ESP32-C5 devkits with a built-in display enabling dual-band WiFi 6 connectivity for IoT and HMI projects. However, one reader lamented the lack of touch-capable screens, at which point kwchow pointed to the ESP32-C5-Touch-LCD-2.8 model offering just that by pairing an ESP32-C5 with a 2.8-inch IPS display with capacitive touch and 320×480 resolution. The new board also features a microSD card slot, a USB-C port for power and programming, a built-in microphone and a speaker connector, a few sensors, and various I/Os connectors for expansion. Let’s have a closer look. ESP32-C5-Touch-LCD-2.8 specifications: Wireless module – Espressif Systems ESP32-C5-WROOM-1-N32R8 SoC – ESP32-C5HR8 CPU Single-core 32-bit RISC-V processor @ up to 240 MHz Low-power RISC-V core @ 40 MHz acting as the main processor for power-sensitive applications Memory – 384 KB SRAM on-chip, 8MB PSRAM Storage – 320 KB ROM Wireless […]