[petsfed]

This sort of underscores the weakness of RPi as a complete computer:

A complete computer is at least somewhat hardened against ESD and what not, has onboard storage of some description, and isn't severely throttled from a power standpoint.

I like RPis and similar for rapid prototyping if I know I need GPIO control, but if you don't, there are better machines out there, at similar price points.

[galangalalgol]

If you need GPIO you might be able to use a uc like an rp2040 or esp32 and connect that to your dell machine. The uc run as cheap as $5 for something that is 32bits with wifi.

[freeopinion]

Or less that $1 for a SoC powered by 32-bit RV32IMAFC RISC-V “SiFive E24 Core”.[0]

[0] https://pine64.com/product/pineseed-bl602-wifi-ble5-soc/

[galangalalgol]

That $4 dev board looks like it might be an esp32 killer, or at least good competition. I was thinking of the esp32-c3 which is also risc-v with wifi and ble. It currently has really great rust support. You can even build the stdlib for it so you don't have to mess with no_std. The bl602 doesn't seem to have rust support yet, but I'm looking forward to more options.

[bArray]

> I was thinking of the esp32-c3 which is also risc-v with wifi and ble.

I have a couple of the Pine64 boards that run Linux. Unless something changed, it doesn't have WiFi or BLE support, and likely never will.

> The bl602 doesn't seem to have rust support yet, but I'm looking forward to more options.

I think it does: https://github.com/bouffalolab/bl-pac/tree/main/bl808

[galangalalgol]

Thanks! It wasn't on the awsome rust embedded github yet, but when I dig in I found it. The bl602 does support wifi, but only 2.4 and I presume at lower rates. It definitely doesn't run linux though. But I wouldn't put it past someone to figure out a way.

[bArray]

> t definitely doesn't run linux though.

Sorry I was thinking of the 0x64, although it's entirely possible to get some form of Linux running.

[snvzz]

Note esp32-c6 is already available. e.g. ESP32-C6-DevKitC-1-N8.

[freeopinion]

It has rust support.

[fanf2]

Does that have any documentation? Or am I looking in the wrong places for it?

[snvzz]

Try github[0]. There's a community around this chip, with repos dedicated to collecting the documentation and code the vendor itself wouldn't provide, or would require filling request forms to obtain.

It tends to be like this with Chinese chips, and often times western ones too, unfortunately.

0. https://github.com/search?q=bl602&type=repositories

[petsfed]

That's where I've landed for the most part. Last real gasp for dev-board-style SBCs, for me, is when I'm severely space constrained, but can afford to locate a USB hub somewhere else. Then its just simple serial comms with a microcontroller that does the timing-sensitive pin twiddling.