SparkFun ESP8266 Thing

Support for the SparkFun ESP8266 Thing modules.

Overview

The SparkFun ESP8266 Thing and SparkFun ESP8266 Thing DEV are low-cost and easy to use breakout and development boards for the ESP8266. Both SparkFun ESP8266 Thing boards are relatively simple boards. The pins are simply broken out to two parallel, breadboard-compatible rows.

Hardware

MCU

Most features of the board are provided by the ESP8266EX SoC.

MCU ESP8266EX
Family Tensilica Xtensa LX106
Vendor Espressif
RAM 80 kByte
Flash 512 kByte
Frequency 80 / 160 MHz
FPU no
Timers 1 x 32 bit
ADCs 1 x 10 bit (1 channel)
LEDs 1 x GPIO1
I2Cs 2 (software implementation)
SPIs 1
UARTs 1 (console)
WiFi built in
Vcc 2.5 - 3.6 V
Datasheet Datasheet
Technical Reference Technical Reference
Board Schematic ESP8266 Thing ESP8266 Thing Dev

Board Versions

Although the board definition works with both boards, it’s important to know that they differ slightly in some features:

Feature ESP8266 Thing ESP8266 Thing Dev
USB to Serial adapter on-board no yes
I2C pull-up resistors on-board yes (jumpable) no [1]
Programming interface FTDI USB to Serial adapter USB
Reset/Flash/Boot logic FTDI USB
Battery connector yes no (can be retrofitted)
LiPo Charger on-board yes no
LED (GPIO5) high active low active [2]
GPIO15 broken out no yes
CHIP_EN broken out yes no

[1] Although the SparkFun ESP8266 Thing Dev has no on-board I2C pull-up resistors, the I2C interface can be used because the ESP8266 SoC has built-in pull-up resistors that are activated by the I2C peripheral driver.

[2] The board configuration defines high-active LEDs. If the SparkFun ESP8266 Thing Dev is used with this board configuration, the LED outputs must be inverted by the application.

RIOT Pin Mapping

The following figures show the mapping of these pin holes to RIOT pins.

Flash SPI pins including GPIO9 and GPIO10 are not broken out. The SparkFun Thing board has solder pads for these pins at the bottom layer.

MCU

Most features of the board are provided by the ESP8266EX SoC.

MCU ESP8266EX
Family Tensilica Xtensa LX106
Vendor Espressif
RAM 80 kByte
Flash 512 kByte
Frequency 80 / 160 MHz
FPU no
Timers 1 x 32 bit
ADCs 1 x 10 bit (1 channel)
LEDs 1 x GPIO1
I2Cs 2 (software implementation)
SPIs 1
UARTs 1 (console)
WiFi built in
Vcc 2.5 - 3.6 V
Datasheet Datasheet
Technical Reference Technical Reference
Board Schematic ESP8266 Thing ESP8266 Thing Dev

Board Versions

Although the board definition works with both boards, it’s important to know that they differ slightly in some features:

Feature ESP8266 Thing ESP8266 Thing Dev
USB to Serial adapter on-board no yes
I2C pull-up resistors on-board yes (jumpable) no [1]
Programming interface FTDI USB to Serial adapter USB
Reset/Flash/Boot logic FTDI USB
Battery connector yes no (can be retrofitted)
LiPo Charger on-board yes no
LED (GPIO5) high active low active [2]
GPIO15 broken out no yes
CHIP_EN broken out yes no

[1] Although the SparkFun ESP8266 Thing Dev has no on-board I2C pull-up resistors, the I2C interface can be used because the ESP8266 SoC has built-in pull-up resistors that are activated by the I2C peripheral driver.

[2] The board configuration defines high-active LEDs. If the SparkFun ESP8266 Thing Dev is used with this board configuration, the LED outputs must be inverted by the application.

RIOT Pin Mapping

The following figures show the mapping of these pin holes to RIOT pins.

Flash SPI pins including GPIO9 and GPIO10 are not broken out. The SparkFun Thing board has solder pads for these pins at the bottom layer.

Flashing the Device

To flash the RIOT image, the device has to be connected to the host computer. Since the SparkFun Thing Dev board has an USB to Serial adapter on board, this can done directly using the Micro USB. SparkFun Thin board has to be connected to the host computer using the FTDI interface and a FTDI USB to Serial adapter/cable. For more information on how to program the SparkFun Thing board, please refer the ESP8266 Thing Hookup Guide.

Note

Please make sure the FTDI USB to Serial adapter/cable uses 3.3 V.

Both boards have a reset/flash/boot logic on-board so that flashing is quite simple. To flash the RIOT image just type:
1
make flash BOARD=esp8266-sparkfun-thing ...

For detailed information about ESP8266 as well as configuring and compiling RIOT for ESP8266 boards, see .