ESP32: the future is now!

Ok, the first drafts of the ESP32 (successor of the ESP8266) as presoldered boards (mostly called development-board) appeared 2016, so acquiring something like this in the current year is nothing special. BUT: I’ve had my hands on an ESP8266-board (nodeMCU v3 – if I remember correctly) and I was astonished! Integrated wifi on such a tiny board and then even micro-USB for flashing, wow. For someone who played with the MSP430-chips from Texas Instruments for his bachelor thesis, this is finally something affordable. “Smaller” than the RPi, but I see alot of potential for gathering and preparing data and the final distribution of information.

So, today I ordered from China (why buy from local or european shops, when you can save 60% if you have time?):

• 2 x ESP32S (240 MHz DualCore from Tensilica, 4 MiByte integrated flash memory, Wifi, Bluetooth)
• 2 x DHT22 temperature and humidity-sensor
• 2 x MAX7219 modules (8×8 LED)
• 2 x MAX7219 modules with 4 blocks in line (32×8 if you want to call it that way)
• 2 x 0.96″ OLED displays RGB(!) and 128×64 pixel

Alltogether for less than 40 €, which is really crazy. Let us hope everything arrives well and in the next five weeks and then the tinkering can start 🙂 Have two “weather sensor-stations” in mind. Maybe a Raspberry as sink for the data. Maybe some Android-app via Blynk. Let us see…

I have the skill(s) – give me the hardware! 🙂