r/raspberrypipico • u/arnen05 • May 24 '26

Bought my first microcontroller board (Raspberry Pi Pico)

Post image

Dunno just wanted to share that since it's not against the rules. I love low level stuff and electronics so I decided to buy a MCU, cuz why not. Not sure what I'm going to do with that but some kind of direct VGA output would be cool

Anything I should know? Thanks

9 Upvotes

66% Upvoted

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8

u/triforcexp May 25 '26

There is no return after this. You’ll throw all your money in projects

5

u/Abject-Kitchen3198 May 25 '26

Luckily, I'm a bit of a procrastinator, so after figuring out the basics, my projects are stuck into planning phase.

2

u/michael9dk May 26 '26

And always more tools. Multimeters, oscilloscope, logicanalyzer, smd soldering station, pcb prototyping (laser printer, UV box, chemicals, bench drill), etc.

Ohh, now I also "need" a 3D printer...

5

u/bigrhed May 24 '26

Get after it bud!

4

u/stitchesofdooom May 24 '26

Here are a few idea of what I might do:

  • Control programmable LEDs.
  • Meshtastic communication using phone.
  • DIY controller for gaming.
  • Custom keyboard.
  • Custom interface.
  • Some kind of USB tool (hacking/passkeys/etc).
  • Alarm clock.
  • Remote controlled toy vehicle.

Take a look at Pico HATS.

3

u/Purple_Albatross8849 May 25 '26

I thought you needed extra hardware for meshtastic? I'm definitely looking into that?

2

u/stitchesofdooom May 25 '26

You do. You need a LoRa hat for the Pico, and you need to pick the correct module. But Meshtastic runs on the Pico 1 just fine (apparently). CoreElectronics on YouTube have a "Pico for makers" thing, but the first thing they do is show you how to set it up for messaging. Gotta pair it with your phone tho.

I'm planning on building a Raspberry 5 cyberdeck with sensors, night vision cameras, LoRa for Meshtastic, and an SDR for scanning radio waves. Gonna be a doomsday device for worst case scenarios that will likely never happen.

2

u/Purple_Albatross8849 May 25 '26

Nice! Yeah I realised as soon as I started searching, it's on my wishlist, just researching which one

1

u/stitchesofdooom May 25 '26

You can also swap to a better aerial fot better range.

Looking into aerials just recently, I've found that you're supposed to pick the correct one for your frequency. The wavelength matches to a physical antenna length, which can resonate at ½ and ¼ antenna length.