Raspberry Pi Pico – The newest microcontroller to the Pi family

Raspberry Pi Pico (microcontroller)

With the release of its latest product, the Raspberry Pi Pico, the Pi family has yet again not disappointed its customers and provided them with the newest tool that makes physical computing relatively easier.

Not only is the product cheap and easy to use, but it is also the first of its kind.

Filled with the latest updates, both hardware and software, the Rasp Pi Pico is a perfect mark achieved by the company. But, what exactly is this product? And how is different from the other? Where can you buy it and what is the price? Let’s understand all of it!

What’s new?

Launched in the January of 2021, Rasp Pi Pico is the first microcontroller manufactured by the foundation.

Unlike the earlier products by the company which were powerful single-board computers, Pico demands from the user to write the code in an external application using Visual Code Studio and load it into the microcontroller.

This makes it highly easy for you to use and interact with various input-output devices.

The microcontroller uses its own silicon RP2040 MCU chip developed by the company for the VERY first time which makes the product extremely unique.

Pico uses a wide range of programming languages to function such as MicroPython, CircuitPython, C++ or C but MicroPython is the officially used language.

To get started with the programming of the microcontroller, you need Thonny Python IDE which is the easiest way to kickstart your Pico.

Raspberry Pi Pico Specifications

The product has been designed to ease out the customer’s user experience. To make it a high-performance microcontroller with flexible digital interfaces, the following features have been added

1. 1. Dual-core Cortex M0+ processor running at up to 133 MHz
   2. 2MB Flash memory
   3. 40 pin 21×51 ‘DIP’ style 1mm thick PCB with 0.1’’ spacing
   4. Exposes 26 multi-function 3.3V General Purpose I/O (GPIO). 3 of these are analogue.
   5. Two UARTs, two SPI interfaces, two I2C interfaces, 16 PWM channels.
   6. Two Programmable IO (PIO) blocks with eight state machines supporting high-speed IO.
   7.  flexible options for powering the unit
   8. A 3-pin ARM Serial Wire Debug (SWD) port.
   9. 264KB SRAM

• 1 × USB 1.1 controller and PHY, with host and device support

Raspberry Pi Pico Pinout

The Raspberry Pi Pico has 40 input and output pins including the Ground and the Voltage Common collector. On bifurcating we get:

1. 8 ground pins that have been designated square pads instead of rounded to ease the distinction of pins.
2. 26 exposed GPIO pins on the minicontroller and a 27th pin for the onboard LED.
3. The board also has 4 12-bit Analogue to Digital Converters out of which, 1 is used for the temperature sensor and is internal.
4. Pico also has 2xI2C buses, 2xSPI buses and 2 UARTs as well that support multiple connections and a total of 16 PWM output channels.
5. Further, the board holds a VBUS pin which is the 5V input from the micro-USB port. The VSYS pin is the main system that supplies power to the RT6150 SMPS to produce a fixed 3.3v output. The boards also contain the 3v3_EN which is Pico’s internal voltage regulator. Finally, we have the 3v3 OUT pin which provides power to Pico to run it externally.

Raspberry Pi Pico Price

One of the biggest factors that make the Rasp Pi Pico a market-friendly product is its low cost. Pico is available at a mere retail price of 4US dollars.

For the Indian Market, the product is not more than 300INR.

The price of the product obviously leads to a great demand of the microcontroller in the market but also puts the company in a fairly competitive market.

Overall, the Pico is a great new addition to the Raspberry Pi family and the best path for beginners to introduce themselves to the world of IoT.

Rasp Pi Pico Datasheet

All the other important technical details related to Raspberry Pi Pico are given in the datasheet

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Let us know what you know more about Raspberry Pi Pico Pinout specifications uses in the comment section below.

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References: 

https://www.raspberrypi.com/products/raspberry-pi-pico/

https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/microcontrollers/raspberry-pi-pico.html

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/raspberry-pi-pico-tutorials-pinout-everything-you-need-to-know

featured and pinout image references- https://projects.raspberrypi.org/