smôl ESP32 Hookup Guide

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Contributors: PaulZC
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Introduction

smôl is a new board format and, as the name suggests, they're really small!

smôl ESP32

SPX-18619
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The smôl ESP32 is a Processor Board for smôl, based on the excellent Espressif ESP32 processor.

Each smôl board measures just 1.60" by 0.42" (40.6mm by 10.7mm). We made the boards just wide enough so we could squeeze USB-C and 16-way Flexible Printed Circuit (FPC) connectors on there. Some of the boards have components on both top and bottom layers which again helps keep the boards small.

smôl boards are designed to stack one on top of the other, using 16-way 0.5mm-pitch FPCs to provide the interconnect from one board to the next. Each board has an IN FPC connector on the bottom layer and an OUT FPC connector on the top layer. The boards stack in a zig-zag daisy chain; signals and power are passed from one board to the next up and down the chain through the FPCs.

Required Materials

As a minimum, you're going to need a USB-C cable to connect your smôl ESP32 to your computer:

Reversible USB A to C Cable - 2m

Reversible USB A to C Cable - 2m

CAB-15424
$8.95
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USB 3.1 Cable A to C - 3 Foot

USB 3.1 Cable A to C - 3 Foot

CAB-14743
$5.50
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The ESP32 Processor Board is part of the smôl ecosystem. Why not pair it with one of the smôl Peripheral Boards?

smôl ARTIC R2

SPX-18618

smôl ZOE-M8Q

SPX-18623

To be able to reduce the sleep current below 10µA, you're going to want to pair the ESP32 with one of our intelligent smôl Power Boards:

smôl Power Board LiPo

smôl Power Board LiPo

SPX-18622
$17.95
smôl Power Board AAA

smôl Power Board AAA

SPX-18621
$17.95

Don't forget that you will need Flexible Printed Circuits to connect your smôl boards together. You're going to need one FPC per board. Our 36mm FPC is the perfect length if you want the smôl boards to stack neatly, one on top of the other.

smôl 36mm 16-way Flexible Printed Circuit

CAB-18731
Retired















Need to do some prototyping with smôl? Or want to connect standard SPI or Qwiic (I2C) boards to your stack? The smôl Header is perfect for that:

smôl Header

smôl Header

SPX-18620
$2.95













Suggested Reading

This is the hookup guide for the smôl ESP32 Processor Board. Click the button below if you want to find out more about smôl itself.

We recommend taking a look through the following tutorials if you are not familiar with the concepts covered in them:

Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI)

SPI is commonly used to connect microcontrollers to peripherals such as sensors, shift registers, and SD cards.

I2C

An introduction to I2C, one of the main embedded communications protocols in use today.