Hacker NewsBaochip-1x: What It Is, Why I'm Doing It Now and How It Came About
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cnx-software.comEsparagus Audio Brick ESP32-based DIN-rail 65W Hi-Fi amplifier supports Home Assistant and Squeezelite (Crowdfunding)
Esparagus Audio Brick ESP32-based DIN-rail 65W Hi-Fi amplifier supports Home Assistant and Squeezelite (Crowdfunding)
Sonocotta (Andriy Malyshenko), the developer of Esparagus “Media Center”, HiFi-Amped, Louder Raspberry Pi, and Louder Raspberry Hat Plus, has returned to Crowd Supply with the Esparagus Audio Brick, a compact ESP32 or ESP32-S3-powered Hi-Fi Class-D amplifier with Home Assistant support. With support for Music Assistant, Snapcast, and Logitech Media Server (LMS), the module can be used to build whole-home audio setups, retrofit vintage speakers with modern streaming features, or power custom speaker configurations such as subwoofers or bi-amp systems. The board is built around an ESP32 or ESP32-S3 dual-core microcontroller with 16 MB flash and 8 MB PSRAM, and features Wi-Fi with optional W5500 SPI Ethernet for connectivity. Audio is processed via a Texas Instruments TAS5825M stereo I²S DAC with an integrated 65 W Class-D amplifier, and includes a DSP for a 15-band equalizer and hardware fault management. Other features include a USB Type-C port with a CH340 chip for
Discovery Drive – An ESP32-S3-based azimuth/elevation rotator for satellite dishes and SDR antennas (Crowdfunding)
Discovery Drive – An ESP32-S3-based azimuth/elevation rotator for satellite dishes and SDR antennas (Crowdfunding)
KrakenRF, the team behind the KrakenSDR, has designed the Discovery Drive ESP32-S3-based, low-cost, fully weatherproof, automatic azimuth/elevation (Az/El) antenna rotator for their Discovery Dish or other directional antennas, such as Yagis and Wi-Fi grids, weighing up to 5kg. Compared to DIY projects like SatNOGS (which require 3D printing and hardware sourcing), the Discovery Drive is designed as a plug-and-play solution. You can simply mount it to a mast, attach the dish, connect to 12V power and Wi-Fi, and use its web UI to start tracking polar-orbiting weather satellites (like METEOR-M2 or FENGYUN), CubeSats, or amateur radio satellites. KrakenRF Discovery Drive specifications: Controller – Espressif Systems ESP32-S3-based control board Connectivity – 2.4 GHz 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi 4 (via ESP32) with external antenna Motor and Rotation Torque – Up to 125 kg·cm (12.25 Nm); supports antenna payloads up to 5 kg Azimuth Range – -360° to +360° Elevation Range – 0° to
DSG-22.6 GHz is a $1,590 open-source RF signal generator based on Atek Midas’s custom ICs (Crowdfunding)
DSG-22.6 GHz is a $1,590 open-source RF signal generator based on Atek Midas’s custom ICs (Crowdfunding)
Atek Midas, a Turkish company, has launched DSG-22.6 GHz, a high-performance, open-source RF signal generator designed to provide professional-grade frequency synthesis at a fraction of the cost of traditional benchtop equipment from manufacturers like Anritsu or Keysight. It has an operating frequency range of 0.15 GHz to 22.6 GHz and is designed for makers and production test environments for RF testing, calibration, wireless experimentation, and microwave research. The device offers 1 Hz tuning resolution, adjustable output power −15 dBm to +20 dBm, and supports linear and logarithmic frequency sweeps with configurable start/stop frequencies, step size, and dwell time. It achieves ≥40 dBc spurious and harmonic suppression on the filtered output path and features a tuning speed of <100 µs. The generator includes a capacitive touchscreen display and can also be controlled over a USB Type-C port and/or Wi-Fi. DSG-22.6 GHz specifications: Frequency range – 150 MHz to 22.6 GHz Tuning
Dabao board features open-source hardware Baochip-1x RISC-V MCU (Crowdfunding)
Dabao board features open-source hardware Baochip-1x RISC-V MCU (Crowdfunding)
An open-source hardware board usually features a closed-source microcontroller or processors, but the Dabao evaluation board goes further with the open-source Boachip-1x MCU, whose RTL files are available. It's also manufactured in such a way that it is inspectable with the Infra-Red, In Situ (IRIS) technique, so users can look at the silicon and confirm they’ve got the right chip in a non-destructive way. Baochip-1x is a "general-purpose" microcontroller with a 350 MHz Vexriscv RV32-IMAC CPU core, a BIO accelerator for I/Os with four 700MHz PicoRV RV32-EMC CPU cores, 4MB of ReRAM, 2MB SRAM, a USB interface, various other I/Os, and hardware secure elements such as cryptography accelerators, key stores, one-way counters, true random number generation, and hardware attack countermeasures such as glitch sensors and a security mesh. The Dabao board itself is pretty basic with the microcontroller, two 16-pin headers for I/Os, a USB-C port for power and programming,
Inkplate 13SPECTRA 13.3-inch E-ink Spectra smart color display supports Arduino, MicroPython, ESPHome (Crowdfunding)
Inkplate 13SPECTRA 13.3-inch E-ink Spectra smart color display supports Arduino, MicroPython, ESPHome (Crowdfunding)
Soldered Electronics has made ESP32-based e-paper displays for years, starting with the launch of the Inkplate 6 in 2019. The Inkplate 13SPECTRA is their latest model based on an ESP32-S3 WiFi and Bluetooth SoC and a 13.3-inch E-Ink Spectra color display with 1600 x 1200 resolution. More specifically, it's powered by an ESP32-S3-WROOM-2-N32R16V module with 32MB SPI flash and 16MB PSRAM, features a microSD card slot for data storage, a USB-C port for data and power, a JST connector for an optional 3,000 mAh LiPo battery, and expansion capabilities through three Qwiic connectors and GPIO expander pins. Inkplate 13SPECTRA specifications: Wireless module - ESP32-S3-WROOM-2-N32R16V SoC - ESP32-S3 dual-core Xtensa LX7 processor (up to 240 MHz) with wireless connectivity System Memory - 16 MB PSRAM Storage - 32 MB flash Wireless - Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n (2.4 GHz), Bluetooth 5 (LE), Storage - MicroSD card slot Display 13.3-inch E-Ink SPECTRA color e-paper
xSDR – A tiny M.2 2230 SDR module with Artix-7 FPGA and LMS7002M RFIC (Crowdfunding)
xSDR – A tiny M.2 2230 SDR module with Artix-7 FPGA and LMS7002M RFIC (Crowdfunding)
Wavelet Lab's xSDR is a tiny, single-sided M.2 2230 software-defined radio (SDR) module designed for integration into laptops, embedded systems, and edge computing devices. A successor to the company's previous uSDR, the "x" in xSDR stands for "extended," adding 2×2 MIMO support and a wider frequency range to the same tiny footprint. The module is built around the Lime Microsystems LMS7002M RFIC and an AMD Artix-7 XC7A50T FPGA as found in the LimeNET Micro 2.0 Developer Edition board. This combination allows for a tuning range of 30 MHz to 3.8 GHz and a sample rate of up to 122.88 MSPS, making this SDR suitable for cellular research (LTE/5G), spectrum analysis, satellite tracking, and high-speed data links (with two modules). Wavelet Lab's xSDR specifications: RFIC – Lime Microsystems LMS7002M programmable RF (FPRF) transceiver IC FPGA – AMD Embedded XC7A50T (Artix-7) with 52,160 logic cells RF capabilities Channels – 2x2 MIMO (2x
LinuxGizmos.comxSDR packs 2×2 MIMO, Artix-7 FPGA, and 3.8 GHz tuning into M.2 2230 form factor
SlimeVR Butterfly Trackers – nRF52833-based, ultra-slim, full-body VR trackers offer up to 48h battery life (Crowdfunding)
SlimeVR Butterfly Trackers – nRF52833-based, ultra-slim, full-body VR trackers offer up to 48h battery life (Crowdfunding)
Designed by SlimeVR in Rotterdam, Netherlands, the SlimeVR Butterfly Trackers are open-hardware, IMU-based, ultra-slim, full-body VR trackers designed for virtual reality gaming, motion capture, VTubing, and more. The trackers provide full-body positional tracking without base stations, cameras, Wi-Fi, or Bluetooth. Each tracker uses an IMU to measure absolute rotation and transmits data over a custom 2.4 GHz ESB protocol via a dedicated dongle supporting up to 10 trackers, eliminating occlusion issues and router setup. Based on Nordic Semi’s nRF52833 wireless MCU, the split “butterfly” design places the PCB and 90 mAh battery side-by-side to achieve a thickness of under 7 mm and a weight below 10 grams, while a flexible interconnect improves comfort when worn under clothing. The system offers a 100–200 Hz refresh rate, <15 ms latency, over 48 hours of battery life with USB-C charging and OTA firmware updates. SlimeVR Butterfly Trackers specifications: Wireless MCU – Nordic nRF52833 CPU
PicoIDE – An open-source hardware IDE/ATAPI drive emulator for vintage computers (Crowdfunding)
PicoIDE – An open-source hardware IDE/ATAPI drive emulator for vintage computers (Crowdfunding)
PicoIDE is an open-source hardware IDE/ATAPI drive emulator based on a Raspberry Pi RP2350 board and designed to replace hard drives and CD-ROM drives in vintage computers with microSD card storage. Users don't need to burn optical discs or deal with old IDE hard drives with bad blocks, and instead, they can simply put their disk images on a microSD card and swap between them as needed. Two versions are offered, namely the PicoIDE Base featuring full IDE/ATAPI emulation in a standard 3.5-inch enclosure with a microSD card slot, and CD audio output, and the PicoIDE Deluxe, adding an ESP32-C3-based front panel with WiFi connectivity, an OLED, and navigation buttons. PicoIDE specifications: MCU - Raspberry Pi RP2350 microcontroller CPU 2x Arm Cortex-M33 cores @ 150 MHz 2x Hazard3 RISC-V cores @ 150 MHz Up to two cores can be used at any time (configured at boot) Memory – 520KB SRAM