The Femtofox Pro Is an Ubuntu-Running Single-Board Computer Built with Meshtastic in Mind

Mononymous maker Tom, also known as "NomDeTom," has built a quasi-single-board computer for those who want to experiment with both low-power Linux applications and the Meshtastic mesh networking project: the Femtofox Pro.

"Femtofox is a flexible and efficient Arm-based Linux development board designed for hobbyists, developers, and engineers who want a compact, low-power computing platform with built-in Meshtastic support, extensive GPIO [General-Purpose Input/Output] access, and flexible connectivity," Tom explains of the device. "Whether you're building a solar-powered Linux node, an IoT [Internet of Things] gateway, a mesh networking device, or something completely new, Femtofox provides the foundation to make it possible."

The Femtofox Pro is built around a low-power Rockchip RV1103 hosted on a Luckfox Pico Mini A single-board computer, giving it a single Arm Cortex-A7 core running at up to 1.1GHz and 64MB of DDR2 memory. While those specifications may seem sedate by modern standards, it's enough to run a tweaked Ubuntu Linux distribution dubbed Foxbuntu — while drawing an impressive 0.27-0.4W during active use, depending on radio usage.

The radio in question is an EBYTE E22 LoRa transceiver, built around the Semtech SX1262, which provides the system with its connection to Meshtastic — a community-driven mesh network that allows nodes to communicate via text and data messages and share their locations. There's a USB Type-C port connected to a WCH CH340 USB to TTY serial adapter for access to the Linux console, USB 2.0 Host and USB Type-C On-The-Go (OTG) connectivity for peripheral devices, and a Raspberry Pi-style general-purpose input/output (GPIO) header with UART, I2C, SPI, and pulse-width modulation (PWM) support. There's also a footprint for a real-time clock, though this isn't provided as standard, and an RJ45 port for wired Ethernet networking.

"Unlike other development boards that require bulky power sources or high energy consumption, Femtofox is designed for ultra-low-power operation while still delivering the power of Linux," Tom claims of the gadget. "You can deploy it anywhere, run full-fledged applications, and leverage LoRa mesh networking for off-grid communication."

Hardware design files for the Femtofox Community Edition, and a "Smol" size-reduced variant, are available on GitHub under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 license; assembled Femtofox Pro boards are available to order from Tom's Tindie store at $81.95 plus shipping.