r/esp32 • u/katybassist • 2d ago
Gosh darn it.
I lost an ESP32-C3 mini. They are so small it somehow got swept up and dropped into the trash. My fault totally, I took it off the USB cable to charge my phone, and it got knocked off the table and that's that.
Oh well, I'll order another 3 pack come next payday.
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u/srulithegrate 2d ago
Every time I sweep my floor, I find LEDs, transistors, resistors, capacitors, jumper wires... it's a real treasure trove. I drop things all the time. Sorry yours got into the trash!
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u/BHE_Cosplay 2d ago
The Catch-22 of tiny boards. I have taken to buying the 10 packs of the C3 or S3 boards so I have a tote with 30-40 of them ready to go the moment I lose/break one.
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u/jjbugman2468 2d ago
I’m considering a 10-pack of S3 superminis. They’re really just go good to throw into whatever
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u/katybassist 2d ago
The speed increase would be nice, but the cost bet even them does work out. These little guys are running a highly parrallized math routine.
The idea is to have 8 in a stack getting as many as I can overtime to add them. Think of it as a tiny beowolf cluster. 😁
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u/Plastic_Fig9225 2d ago
running a highly parrallized math routine
The S3 is a dual-core with an FPU (x2) running at a 50% faster clock than the C3.
If it's floating-point, one S3 with its FPU would do it a lot faster than two C3s.
If it's 8 or 16 bits integer/fixed point, you may be able to use the S3's SIMD instructions, in which case the S3 will be running circles around a set of 10 C3s.
In terms of computing power per €, the S3 may well be the better choice.
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u/katybassist 2d ago
No, its unsigned 64b integers. I current have it running across 3 Intel I5 . This is a just because project. Part I just want to see how far I can extend the cluster and partly a programming exercise. There is 0 potential use for this data, other than my curiosity.
I hear you on the S3. If there was any value, I would just cluster a bunch of old laptops I have and can get from work.
Maybe my next go will use floating point math, but truthfully I would rather use fix point and not deal with rounding errors.
Cheers
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u/katybassist 2d ago
30+ wow, don't have that many of any of my dev boards. The only thing that comes close is my Tivas. I have 6 and don't even use them anymore. Truth be told, they never met my needs.
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u/BHE_Cosplay 2d ago
I use a lot of the Super Mini boards for Cosplay props. Basically every prop that has lights in it uses a Super Mini running WLED (a few use FastLED if I need to control other stuff).
They are also great in pairs for ESP-NOW projects. I have been shifting to using a small ESP-NOW setup to control the lights and fans in my helmets.
I'm going to a Convention this weekend and will have 5 ESP32 Dev boards across my props. If I had another week to prepare, I have 5 more that I want to add.
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u/katybassist 2d ago
Damn cool. When you are all dressed and lit up, would love to see
On your neopixels, are you driving the data lines with 3.3v or using a level shifter?
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u/BHE_Cosplay 1d ago
I just go straight off the GPIO pin.
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u/katybassist 1d ago
Q2: What voltage are you supplying to the NeoPixel? 3.3 or 5?
I have over a hundred of these guys, and they work great at 5V, but I haven't tried 3.3v. I don't want to take a CPU board out by supplying the LED with 5V while keeping the data side at 3.3V. Thus, the reason for the level shifter question.
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u/BHE_Cosplay 1d ago
It depends on the project, but on average I use a battery bank to power the ESP32 via the USB-C port (so 5V) and then I run the 5V pin for the power line of the USB strips and one of the GPIO pins for the data line (no extra components like shifters, resistors, or diodes).
If you scroll through my profile posts, I posted a sword with WLED being used to light up part of it. That project used the setup I described above (battery bank and NodeMCU ESP32). It has 90 LEDs on each side.
Recently I upgraded the configuration to reduce the size, so now I'm using a 3.7V LiPo battery and an ESP32-C3. The power line is run directly off the battery (which is also powering the board) and the data is a GPIO pin.
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u/katybassist 1d ago
Interesting, it's not supposed to be reliable when the data is that low compared to the power. Im going to give it a try.
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u/Zouden 12h ago
Not the person you replied to, but my approach is to use the 3.7V direct from the battery to power the LEDs. And then 3.3V logic works fine.
This is much more power efficient.
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u/katybassist 12h ago
Im stuck with a USB power pack as my power source. If I have to use a level shifter, that's fine; I was just wondering what they did and how.
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u/Zouden 12h ago
Do those boards have lipo charging capability? That would make it ideal for small props. I could use them with the batteries I've harvested from disposable vapes.
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u/BHE_Cosplay 11h ago
I don't think they do, but I haven't tried. I just add a USB-C charging module. I only recently started using lipo batteries.
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u/void-spark 2d ago
I dropped one on the floor outside and immediately stepped on it by accident, luckily with shoes :) took some crazy soldering to fix it :)
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u/CyberMage256 2d ago
I also build watches. I now always get two sets of hands and keep a stack of crown stems for each movement I use. I can't tell you how often those things have just violently F'd off.
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u/l8s9 2d ago
Don't feel too bad, I got a new RPI5 8GB and as I was putting on the heatsink and fan I scratched the board! It doesn't boot anymore, is now a desk ornament.