Pimoroni Celebrates the Raspberry Pi Pico W Launch with an Explosion of "Pico W Aboard" Carriers
Ranging from a wide-format RGB LED matrix to a full outdoor weather station setup, the new Pico W Aboard range is off to a flying start.
Pimoroni has celebrated the launch of the new Raspberry Pi Pico W in style, announcing a range of carrier board designs under the "Pico W Aboard" label — including cameras, color ePaper displays, environment monitors, and more.
Raspberry Pi officially launched the Raspberry Pi Pico W earlier today as a $6 follow-up to its breathtakingly popular $4 original design, boasting on-board Wi-Fi and the potential for Bluetooth connectivity in the future. Sheffield-based Pimoroni has taken the opportunity to launch a whole new family of carrier boards designed to take advantage of the new model's radio — identified using the "Pico W Aboard" logo.
The company's launch is broad. There's the Inky Frame 5.7", a color E Ink photo frame that can download data over Wi-Fi. There's the Enviro Camera, which includes a two megapixel camera and an additional 8MB of flash storage, plus an optional waterproof case. For environment monitoring, there's the Enviro Urban air quality monitor, the Enviro Weather weather monitor, Enviro Indoor, and the Enviro Grow — the latter aimed at automated plant care using soil moisture sensors and a watering pump.
Elsewhere in the range is the Inventor 2040 W, which expands on the features already present on the Raspberry Pi Pico W by adding connectors for six servos, 12 addressable RGB LEDs, a speaker connector, and battery support. The Automation 2040 W is similar but larger, designed specifically for automation projects and boasting three 12-bit analog to digital converter (ADC) inputs and five digital inputs all supporting up to 40V signals, three digital sourcing outputs capable of 4A continuous or 2A at 500Hz pulse-width modulation current at supply voltage, and three relays supporting 2A at up to 24V or 1A at up to 40V.
Finally there's the unusually-named Galactic Unicorn, a 53×11 grid of 583 RGB LEDs in a 330×78mm (around 13×3.1") footprint. The board includes five user-programmable tactile buttons at one end plus a sleep/wake button, intensity control, and volume control at the other — the latter coming into its own if you fit an optional speaker. The board also includes Qwiic/STEMMA QT connectors for additional hardware and a battery connector for wire-free use.
The Inventor 2040 W and Automation 2040 W are now in stock with the remainder of the new devices either available for pre-order or coming soon on the official Pimoroni store; prices range from $30.25 for the Enviro Weather without bundled Raspberry Pi Pico W up to $121 for a complete Enviro Weather bundle with outdoor weather station sensors.