Discussing STM32-based boards

Hardwareentwicklung / hardware development Hardwareschmiede / Hardware development
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Introduction

@Basti, @weef, @roh and @GuntisL are well looking into the direction of STM32. Occasionally, this already popped up in the past, see Topics tagged stm32.

While @weef and others reported about quality issues of the el cheapo Blue Pill boards becoming popular some time ago – see LoRaNode auf Basis des STM32F103C8 aka Blue Pill – we might want to have a look again what’s available on the market right now on the lower-price segment without sacrificing quality. @roh is also looking into that direction within Der CAN-Bus-Thread.

Thanks already!

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While I can’t tell anything about quality, I just found the https://medium.com/swlh/super-blue-pill-like-stm32-blue-pill-but-better-6d341d9347da, which people might well find interesting as it uses an ESP8266 to provide a WiFi interface – similar to what other manufacturers are doing these days.

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As we are occasionally doing MicroPython these days, I am personally looking into possibilities to run it on this thing. As the MCUs on the boards mentioned above are usually lower flash sized STM32 MCUs, there has to be put in quite some effort. See also [STM32F103] - Porting MicroPython to the "BluePill" board - MicroPython Forum and STM32 Blue Pill — Analyse and Optimise Your RAM and ROM.

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While the WeAct V1.3 STM32F411CEU6 dev board has 512 KByte of Flash and 128 KByte of SRAM [1], it can optionally be populated with an SPI flash chip. It has been tested with:

  • Winbond W25Q32 (4 MByte)
  • Winbond W25Q64 (8 MByte)
  • Winbond W25Q128 (16 MByte)

Sister boards with more memory are also listed here within related boards, like the BLACK_F407ZG featuring a STM32F407ZG MCU and 1024 Kb of flash memory instead of 512 Kb.

  1. In comparison, the pyboard-D has 512KiB internal flash ROM / 256KiB internal RAM for the lower end models (PYBD-SF2-W4F2 and PYBD-SF3-W4F2) and 2048KiB internal flash ROM / 512KiB internal RAM for the top-of-the-line model (PYBD-SF6-W4F2). All three models have a 2 MiB external QSPI flash with execute capabilities to extend internal flash and an (additional?) 2 MiB external QSPI flash for user filesystem and storage. ↩︎

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Der häufig auf den BluePill verwendete STM32F103 (Cortex-M3) im QFP-Gehäuse gehört zu den beliebtesten 32bit-MPUs - gerade diese sind durch die aktuellen Verknappungen auf dem weltweiten Halbleitermarkt praktisch nicht mehr erhältlich, obwohl in Produktion. Da dieser Zustand noch wenigstens ein Jahr lang anhalten wird, haben die Nachbauten und clones dieser Prozessoren gerade Hochkonjunktur.

Wie gerufen kommt daher ein tool zum Feststellen des genauen Prozessortyps (für STM32F1 und clones): BluePillDiagnostics

https://mecrisp-stellaris-folkdoc.sourceforge.io/bluepill-diagnostics-v1.6.html

Project: id-swdcom
Version: 1.631
Created: Mon  8 Feb 2021 14:09:48 AEDT
Author 2021 by t.j.porter <terry@tjporter.com.au>
Purpose: Determine if your BluePill board contains a genuine STM32F103C8 
MCU, attempt to determine clone type if not.
Intended Audience: Blue Pill owners
MCU: STM32F103 and clones
Board: BluePill
Core: Mecrisp-Stellaris RA 2.5.5 for STM32F103 by Matthias Koch
Clock: 72 MHz
Core Options enabled: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7
Required: USB cable, serial terminal emulator, works on any OS. The USB 
virtual serial (any baudrate) will start in the Bluepill diagnostics menu.
Web Sites Consulted: https://www.blaatschaap.be/32f103-comparison-part-3/ 
My thanks to Andre for his work with the Jdec data.
For the latest project updates see: 
https://mecrisp-stellaris-folkdoc.sourceforge.io/bluepill-diagnostics-v1.6.html
License: MIT, please see COPYING
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