As the year comes to an end, it’s time to recommend some development boards. This time, I have selected a few boards priced from 9.9 to 99, all with free shipping included. For those without free shipping, the shipping cost will be included in the price. The recommended development boards are all from reputable brands, ensuring better quality control and after-sales service.
9.9
The first development board I recommend isHezhao RP2040
At 9.9 with free shipping, this price is cheaper than various ESP32 clone boards and Arduino UNO clones. However, I noticed that the Raspberry Pi Pico is now available for under 20. If that’s the case, I must say that the RP2040 chip will replace the Arduino UNO and become the best choice for those wanting to get started with open-source hardware, after all, at 9.9 with free shipping, what more can you ask for?
10~20
This range includes most ESP32 clone boards and various Arduino development boards, so I won’t elaborate further.
27~29.9
Here I still recommend the Hezhao ESP32-S3
At 29.9, with 8MB PSRAM + 16MB Flash, it can handle most situations. The official ESP32-S3 development board from Espressif is priced around 50, which is quite expensive. This price is very reasonable and the size is compact, with good workmanship.
Another one worth recommending is the Sipeed M0S Dock, priced at 27
It uses the BOLT BL616 chip, RISC-V core, with a frequency of up to 320MHz, 480KB SRAM on chip, 4M Flash, and supports Wi-Fi6 and Bluetooth 5.2 at 2.4GHz frequency. It features USB2.0 HS OTG with a maximum speed of 480Mbps, while all of Espressif’s USB2.0 products can only reach 12Mbps.
Additionally, the module size is only 10x11mm, and it also integrates a ceramic antenna.
The module is priced at 19.9, and the development board is priced at 27. It can be said to be a strong competitor to the ESP32, but the downside is that MicroPython and Arduino IDE do not yet support BOLTs chip. This is a significant drawback for BOLTs chip development boards.
If you are not satisfied with the 320MHz frequency, you can choose the Sipeed M1S Dock.
It features the BOLTs BL808 chip, with a tri-core design at 480MHz, 320MHz, and 160MHz, 768KB SRAM on chip, 64MB UHS PSRAM, 16MB Flash, and includes a 0.1TOPS computing power NPU, with MIPI+DVP interfaces supporting camera resolutions up to 1080P. The module is priced at 45, and the development board is priced at 69.
Next, we move to
43~47
This price range is impressive, as we can start playing with Linux and it also reaches the threshold for FPGA.
I want to introduce theLuckfox Pico Mini
It is a micro Linux development board based on the Rockchip RV1103 chip, featuring a Cortex A7 1.2GHz core, and a RISC-V architecture MCU, with a 0.5TOPS computing power NPU. It has 64MB DDR2 memory, 17 GPIO pins, a camera interface, and a TF card slot. Its price is 39.
Luckfox Pico Mini purchase link
If you want higher specifications, you can check out Luckfox’s Pico and Pico Pro
With more pins, memory can be increased to 128MB, 256MB, and it can also include on-board SPI NAND Flash, with options for 128MB and 256MB. This development board can run a trimmed-down Linux system, allowing for more functionalities, and it includes an NPU for tasks such as image recognition.
Another one worth recommending is the Milk-V Duo
It uses the CVITEK CV1800B chip design, with two C906 RISC-V cores, one core frequency of 1GHz, and another at 700MHz, along with an 8051 MCU with 8KB SRAM, and a 0.5TOPS computing power TPU, supporting Gigabit Ethernet. It has DDR2 64MB memory, 26 pins, dimensions of 51mm x 21mm, and a 16Pin MIPI CSI FPC interface, with a TF card slot. An SD NAND pad is available for future storage expansion.
For higher configurations, you can choose the recently released Milk-V Duo 256MB version, which swaps the core for SG2002, in addition to the two RISC-V cores, it adds a Cortex-A53 core, with a computing power of 1TOPS@int8, making its performance quite impressive. The Milk-V Duo, 64MB version is priced at 35, and the 256MB version is priced at 49.9, which I think is very worth it for the extra ten or so bucks.
In this price range, I also want to mention an FPGA development board, Sipeed Tang Nano 1K
Priced at 42. It is designed based on the high-cloud semiconductor GW1NZ-1 FPGA chip, with 1152 logic units (LUT4) and 864 registers (FF). Dimensions are 58.34×21.29. If you want to try FPGA, this can be considered a relatively cost-effective choice.
Sipeed Tang Nano 1K purchase link
If you want higher performance, you can choose the Sipeed Tang Nano 4K, 9K, 20K, etc. development boards.
Sipeed Tang Nano 9K purchase link, priced at 89
Now let’s jump directly to
99
This price range is familiar, as it includes the Orange Pi options, with the 1GB LPDDR4 version of the Orange Pi Zero3 priced at 99, based on the Allwinner H618 design, featuring a quad-core Cortex-A53 with a frequency of up to 1.5GHz, Gigabit Ethernet, USB interface, Type-C power interface, Wi-Fi5 and Bluetooth 5.0, MicroHDMI interface, dimensions of 50x55mm. It supports Android TV 12, Debian 12, Ubuntu 22.04, with 26 GPIO plus 13 functional interfaces, at 99, what more can you ask for?
Orange Pi Zero3 purchase link
If you think that’s still not cheap enough, you can also check out the Orange Pi Zero2W, which also uses the H618 chip, but with fewer interfaces and smaller dimensions, priced 10 bucks cheaper than Zero3, so choose according to your needs.
Alright, that’s all for today’s recommendations. One phenomenon we can observe this year is that RISC-V development boards under 50 are becoming more numerous and cost-effective, giving us more choices. However, it seems that Espressif has not yet released particularly standout products in this affordable price segment. Recently, Espressif is set to launch their new products, the ESP32-P4 and ESP32-C5, both adopting the RISC-V architecture, as they are also embracing RISC-V.
In the SBC single-board computer field, there have also been some impressive products with RISC-V recently, but currently, the price advantage is still not obvious. We look forward to more RISC-V development boards in the future, providing us with more excellent products to choose from.
FPGA, which previously seemed like a high-end item, can now be found at this price point, to be honest, I did not expect that; with domestic chips, a better future is definitely possible.
Another point worth mentioning is that in the price range of 50 to 90, I surprisingly did not see particularly suitable development boards. I hope manufacturers can fill this price gap, rather than just upgrading the memory and calling it a day.
Alright, I’ll stop here. If you have anything to say, remember to comment. If you think what I said was good, remember to like, and see you in the next issue.
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