WattUp 1W active energy harvesting developer kit enables at-a-distance wireless charging

WattUp 1W Active Energy Harvesting Transmitter

Two years ago, we noted Energous’ WattUp hearables developer kit that would charge earbuds with the company’s WattUp near-field wireless charging technology. The company has now introduced the WattUP 1W active energy harvesting developer kit capable of charging multiple IoT devices with at-a-distance wireless charging. The kit is said to be “active” because there’s a 6-inch transmitter, let’s call it a power gateway, and several IoT devices that harvest energy from it. Traditional passive solutions will harvest ambient energy from the surrounding environment, and may not deliver enough power, and do so unpredictably. The developer kit comes with the transmitter, plus one or more receiver units, and relies on the following main chips: Transmitter Dialog Semiconductor DA14682 SmartBond Bluetooth 5.0 Cortex-M0 SoC Dialog Semiconductor DA4100 Wireless Power Transmitter SoC Dialog Semiconductor DA3210 1W Power Amplifier A discrete rectifier and a DA2210 WPT rectifier Receiver(s) Dialog Semiconductor DA14531 Cortex-M0+ BLE 5.1 […]

SONOFF Smart Stackable Power Meter supports up to 128 20A relays

SPM RS485 daisy-chaining

ITEAD has introduced many smart switches over the year under the SONOFF brand, and their latest SONOFF Smart Stackable Power Meter is DIN mountable and made for larger industrial applications with up to 128 devices. The solution is comprised of the “SPM-Main” WiFi connected main unit controlling up to 32 “SPM-4Relay” units with 4 relays each using RS485 daisy-chaining. SPM-Main specifications: Storage – MicroSD card slot up to 32GB to store up to 180 days of energy usage data Connectivity Ethernet 2.4 GHz 802.11b/g/n WiFi 4 RS485 master Power Input – 100-240V 50/60Hz up to 50mA max Dimensions – 142.5 x 90 x 66.5 mm (PC V0 material) SPM-4Relay specifications: Connectivity – RS485 Power Input – 100-240V 50/60Hz up to 20A per relay, 80A total Power Output – 100-240V 50/60Hz up to 20A per relay, 80A total Safety – Current, voltage, and power overload protection with delay function from 0 […]

SmartBug smart switch integrates neatly into in-wall sockets (Crowdfunding)

SmartBug Smart Switch

SmartBug is a smart switch based on ESP32 wireless SoC, equipped with several sensors to measure temperature, humidity, power usage, and listen to sounds. It is designed to fit neatly into most in-wall sockets found around the world. Each SmartBug relies on mesh networking to communicate with each other and extend the range, WiFi for Internet connection, and Bluetooth low energy (BLE) to control additional devices without the need for any additional hub. SmartBug’s key features: MCU – 32-bit dual-core microcontroller with WiFi, wireless mesh, Bluetooth LE Connectivity 2.4GHz WiFI 4 Wireless mesh to let SmartBug act as a signal repeater Bluetooth 4.0 and BLE to control home appliances Audio Digital microphone for voices commands, baby crying (only enable if the plugin is downloaded in the app). Buzzer On-Off Relay up to 2200W, both AC and DC. Sensors – Temperature & humidity sensor, built-in power meter (current, voltage, and power) […]

NuCurrent showcases NFC charging at 3W, data rates up to 848 kb/s

NuevaNFC 3W power

The NFC Forum approved the Global Wireless Charging (WLC) specification last year with the new standard making it possible to wirelessly charge small, battery-powered consumer and IoT devices with a smartphone or other NFC charging device at a power transfer rate of up to one watt. The NFC WLC currently specifies power levels ranging from 100mW – 1W transmitted and data rates up to 106 kb/s, but NuCurrent claims to have gone beyond WLC specs, delivering over 3x more wireless power and over 8x faster data speeds. This was achieved with the company’s NuEva Development Platform for Near-Field Communication (NFC) Wireless Charging technology that provided up to 3W of power received (as opposed to just transmitted in the WLC specification) and data rates of up to 848 kb/s. NuCurrent expects the higher NFC charging power and data rates to enable new applications for small, space-constrained devices including wrist-wearables, smartwatches, styluses, […]

$5 board eases ATX power supply connection to single board computers

ZJ-012 ATX Power Supply single board computer

Many people have ATX power supplies from older desktop PCs that they may want to reuse with Arduino boards, Raspberry Pi, or other single board computers. It’s indeed possible to do so by trimming some cables and making a circuit to protect the board from over-voltage or over-current. But ZJ-012 adapter board offers a simpler solution with a 24-pin header for the ATX power supply, terminal blocks for connection to the target board, some fuses for protection, and a header to connect an on/off button. JZ-012 (also known as JZ-024) ATX power adapter board’s key features and specifications: Power Input – 20-pin or 24-pin computer ATX power supply Power output – 9-pin terminal block with +3.3V, +5V, -12V, +12V, +5V, GND with fuses for each power outputs On/Off control – Toggle switch or header for external button/switch (shorted for power on) Misc – Power indicator (red LED) Dimensions – 70 […]

Rockchip RK835 & RK837 fast charger chips support USB PD 3.0, QC4+, and VOOC

Rockchip is better known for its application processors for TV boxes (RK3328), Chromebooks and other higher-end hardware (RK3399), AIoT applications (RK3566), and more, but the company has recently introduced the RK83x family with RK835 and RK837 chips designed for fast chargers compatible with USB PD 3.0 and/or Qualcomm Quick Charge 4+ and BBK Electronics’ VOOC. RK835 Specifications MCU sub-system – Arm Cortex-M0 with 60KB flash, 1KB RAM USB PD 2.0/3.0 and PSS with TID number 4325 USB Type-C and Vconn power source Supports proprietary protocols 8-channel 10-bit, 500Hz converter speed ADC sensing voltage and 1-channel 10-bit current ADC All GPIOs can be configured as ADC input or edge triggering input DP/DM pins can be configured as UART, BC 1.2, or GPIO mode High-voltage endurance DP/DM and CC1/2 pins I2C interface with slave and master modes Low-power RC oscillator, 3 timers, one watchdog Discharge N-MOSFETs for VCC and VBUS Power – […]

USB Type-C Specification 2.1 allows up to 240W Extended Power Range (EPR)

USB PD EPR Flow 240W

Many devices have switched from a Micro USB port or a power barrel jack to the USB-C port in recent years, as the latter allows for higher currents, and up to 100W power input in USB PD (Power Delivery) compliant systems. While 100W will be more than enough for most devices, more power-hungry devices or systems still need a power brick, for example, gaming laptops and mobile workstations. But the USB Type-C specification 2.1 aims to change that by upping the maximum power to 240W. As noted by Benson Leung in a Reddit Thread the part of the specification that handles the 240W power is the EPR (“Extended Power Range”) that defines requirements for cables, chargers, and devices: 3.11 Extended Power Range (EPR) Cables 3.11.1 Electrical Requirements Extended Power Range cables have additional requirements to assure that these cables can deliver the full defined voltage and current range for USB […]

Zoom i.MX 8M Mini Development Kit supports power usage monitoring

Beacon EmbeddedWorks iMX8M Som & Devkit

NXP i.MX 8M Mini 14nm Cortex-A53/M4 processor has been around for a couple of years, and several SoM-based development kits are available including Variscite Symphony starter kit, HummingBoard Ripple SBC, or congatec conga-SEVAL007010 evaluation board. Beacon EmbeddedWorks’ Zoom i.MX 8M mini development kit is based on the company’s i.MX 8M Nano System on Module (SOM) and offers features not found on most other devkits or single board computers such as power usage monitoring and control through their Wattson power measurement application. Zoom i.MX 8M mini development kit key features & specifications: System-on-Module SoC – NXP i.MX 8M Mini processor with up to four Arm Cortex-A53 cores @ up to 1.8 GHz, an Arm Cortex-M4 real-time core at up to 400 MHz, Vivante 3D & 2D GPU’s System Memory – Up to 8GB of 32-bit wide LPDDR4 memory Storage – eMMC flash, QSPI NOR flash Networking Gigabit Ethernet PHY Wireless module […]

EDATEC Raspberry Pi 5 fanless case