“Amazing that we can benefit from these sort of products for the price! I did hear that if you do a Whetstone benchmark on one of these it comes out as quicker than an ICL 1904S mainframe cpu which was all the computing power for a whole University in the late 1970s. The ICL would have had 196kb equivalent memory in total and a massive 6 disk drives each of a huge 8Mb. That would be massive physically rather than capacity - each one would be about the size of a chest freezer. Things were more like they used to be than they are now.”
“A great little board, and the addition of wireless connectivity and faster processing make the board really useful. I've developed three new, wirelessly connected projects in the few days since they arrived.”
“The Raspberry Pi Pico 2 W is a significant update to the original Pico series, bringing wireless capabilities with 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi 4 and Bluetooth 5.2 via the CYW43439 chip. At a price point of $7, it remains affordable for hobbyists and developers looking to integrate connectivity into their projects.
Key features include 4MB of onboard flash, 520KB of SRAM, and compatibility with popular programming environments such as MicroPython, CircuitPython, C, and C++. The board maintains the same physical design as the Pico W, allowing seamless use of existing accessories and add-ons. Its castellated edges are particularly useful for surface-mount soldering, making it a flexible choice for embedded applications.
The Pico 2 W offers low-power performance, with enhanced support for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth functionality at launch. Testing has shown reliable connectivity for web-based applications and Bluetooth pairing, making it ideal for IoT and real-time data applications. However, some users have noted the absence of a dedicated reset button, which could improve development convenience.
Overall, the Pico 2 W is a powerful upgrade for projects requiring wireless capabilities while retaining the simplicity and low cost of the original Pico series.”
