
OSHChip: A $25 Cortex-M0 with BTLE in DIP-16 - unwind
https://www.tindie.com/products/OSHChip/oshchip-v10/
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ascorbic
This is nice, but aside from the breadboard-friendly package I'm not sure if
it offers any advantage over all of the other nRF51822 modules that are
available. Seeed offer one with the same SoC for $7.50, and it's not that hard
to solder the package.

[http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/MDBT40P%C2%A0%C2%A0nRF51822...](http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/MDBT40P%C2%A0%C2%A0nRF51822%C2%A0based%C2%A0BLE%C2%A0module-p-2503.html)

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nsb1
Not to mention the teensy line. Unless you *really need the slightly smaller
size, these things are great:

[https://www.pjrc.com/teensy/](https://www.pjrc.com/teensy/)

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jack12
Just to be explicit, while this competes in the "tiny but breadboard-friendly
microcontroller" market, it's not a nRF51 board (it's actually a more powerful
chip, CPU-wise) and it does not have any sort of radio, bluetooth or
otherwise.

The support from PJRC is great, though. And if you want to use the Arduino
environment, I don't think _anyone_ puts more work into making it work
flawlessly on a non-AVR platform than Paul does, not even the Arduino guys
themselves with their own ARM boards.

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nasduia
"Shipping to United Kingdom starts at $36.00 (£25.67 GBP)"

More than the product!

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hga
$8 to the US; I get books and CDs from the UK for $4 including S&H thought
Amazon.com, granted, those outfits do it in bulk, but I wonder why it's so
much more.

Tron-Club, which ships kits, packets of electronics and a manual once a month
from Canada, will ship to the U.K. for £3.99, or £14.99 total vs. $19.99 to
the US ([http://tronclub.com/subscribe](http://tronclub.com/subscribe)).

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CraigJPerry
Tron club looks awesome, I just subscribed. Thanks for sharing this

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hga
You're very welcome. They make a few mistakes which they correct (on the forum
and then ship with a subsequent kit), but they're otherwise totally awesome,
just got my 7th kit.

Here's a prior HN discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9889777](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9889777)
and per my comment, they do indeed do a moderate amount of analog.

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detaro
(related) OT: is there anything similar to this/ESP8266 with wired Ethernet
(PoE would be _awesome_ , but not necessary)?

There are a bunch of boards based on the WS5100, but that isn't that powerful
and doesn't have great tooling, and then you quickly end up with "full" ARM
boards like the raspberry, with size and price to match.

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asmithmd1
You may have a hard time finding great tooling AND a price lower than the
Raspberry Pi. The MBED boards are very easy to use but are a little pricey.
This board is an OpenWRT router chip (Ethernet and WiFi) for 15 Euros but you
will have to rely on generic OpenWRT documentation:

[https://www.olimex.com/Products/OLinuXino/RT5350F/](https://www.olimex.com/Products/OLinuXino/RT5350F/)

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detaro
Yeah, but look at what a ESP8266 does and costs, so it doesn't hurt to ask ;)
Raspberry with Ethernet mostly is a bit big, if they made a Raspberry zero
with Ethernet for 15-20$ it would be good enough.

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icebraining
You can add a cheap SPI-Ethernet adapter to the Zero, it plugs directly:
[http://raspi.tv/2015/ethernet-on-pi-zero-how-to-put-an-
ether...](http://raspi.tv/2015/ethernet-on-pi-zero-how-to-put-an-ethernet-
port-on-your-pi)

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elcct
How this is better than ESP8266?

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pi-rat
How is a banana better than an apple? :) They are two different beasts, with
two different stacks, and two different means of communication - all with
completely different tradeoffs.

A Cortex-M0 + BLE setup would easily outlast an ESP8266 battery-wise, it would
also make more sense on the go (BLE devices can communicate directly with a
phone app, without much setup). While an ESP8266 is more general - can connect
directly to wifi (more work, and more "stationary").

~~~
ascorbic
It's more how is a banana better than a chicken. Sure they're both food, but
you're unlikely to have a situation where they're direct substitutes.

