Commercial Equivelent to ESP32?

[logancane]

Hi everyone,

I'm just wondering what the commercial equivalent to the ESP32 is (i.e. what do IoT designers typically use to obtain BT and Wi-Fi functionality?)

For context, I'm looking at doing a project that would incorporate Bluetooth audio and Wi-Fi (just basic API calls, nothing too high bandwidth). I'm not hugely constrained on space, power, or number of GPIO's required, but I am constrained by manufacturability (i.e. It needs to be either solderable by hand, or available in the JLCPCB catalogue as something that they can assemble).

Now the ESP32 is the obvious choice for such a purpose, but my main goal with this project is to broaden my horizons a bit and gain experience in traditional embedded systems development (e.g. Programming in C, interfacing hardware in a PCB design etc...). My goal is to make something that (at least on a surface level) could pass as a commercial design.

From my own research, it seems the combination of a MCU with integrated BT and a separate Wi-Fi module connected via SDIO is the way to go, but I'm struggling to find a combination that suits the constraints above. Keen to hear your thoughts.

Cheers!

[ozkarah]

I have spent some time with ESP32 and I think Espressif did a pretty good job and the new chip ESP32 S3 has very promising new features (I wish they did not remove the eth phy). There are already some industrial implementations of ESP32 like Norvi.

You already know the pros. Some cons I suffered from:
- ADC is not very stable
- Simultaneous use of WiFi and BT is problematic.
- Rise-fall times of the GPIO are not the fastest.
- Ethernet phy is removed from the latest chip S3.


Development boards around have a very low build quality, but I think genuine modules and the new development board for S3 have a decent quality enough for commercial applications.

I am also very curious about the comments from the other contributors here ..

[SiliconWizard]

You have a number of alternatives from TI, Nordic...
Thing is, almost none (that I know of) supports both Wifi and Bluetooth - it's usually one or the other. But I possibly missed a few.

TI as a whole series of RF+MCU SoCs in the CCxxxx series. You have Wifi with the CC32xx line for instance, and Bluetooth (or other low-power 2.4 GHz protocol) with the CC25xx/26xx... etc.

[ataradov]

One thing to note here - typical "established vendor" development process is miserable. You will struggle and hate every second of it.

But yes, TI, SiLabs, Nordic, NXP are go to guys.

ESP32 is used in a lot of commercials products, so I would not count it as something marginal and to be avoided.

[tooki]

ESP32 is used in a lot of commercials products, so I would not count it as something marginal and to be avoided.

Can you give any examples? This question has come up before, and the consensus was that no significant commercial products used ESP32.

[pigrew]

Qualcomm, NXP, Broadcomm, Infinion, Synaptics, Murata, and Marvell are all common in commercial products. The issue is their documentation is mostly confidential, so hobbyists won't be able to use them (easily). In many cases, there will be large minimum order quantities.

The chipsets often will use QSPI for 802.11, plus a UART for BLE. Often the MCU is separate from the radio chip. For example, the Cypress CYW43439 has both WiFi and BT.

It sounds like the target is a hobby products? (I'm surmising from the request for easy to solder parts). You might want to stick with the ESP32 (due to parts availability) and use an external ADC or even external MCU to cover the weaknesses of the ESP32.

For small production runs, a company would likely choose a pre-made module (due to simpler compliance testing). For mass production, you'd use the bare IC and integrate the RF matching components on your custom PCB.

In terms of learning, I don't see any issue with using the ESP32. In terms of easy of manufacturing, definitely buy a module. The u-blox NINA-W151-03B looks interesting and is in stock. (EDIT: Oh, Kean noticed that these are actually ESP32... ) Laird and Espressif modules also have stock... you might be able to find something from Silicon Labs, too.

[ataradov]

Can you give any examples? This question has come up before, and the consensus was that no significant commercial products used ESP32.

I really can't. I've seen them come up in various teardowns, but I don't keep the score. To be fair I can't name a product using any of the reputable ICs either.

Quick search indeed does not show any lists like this, so I guess I will start noting it in the future.

They definitely were not in world-known brand name products, but they were still in products shipped in large quantities, not hobby kits or anything like this.

At the same time, I don't see what would make them unsuitable for the real products. Big companies will continue to use big brand chips ("nobody got fired for buying IBM" mentality), of course.

[oPossum]

Sonoff uses EPS8266 and ESP32:  https://sonoff.tech/

A list of some home automation devices that use ESP32: https://templates.blakadder.com/esp32.html

[Kean]

ESP32 is used in a lot of commercials products, so I would not count it as something marginal and to be avoided.

Can you give any examples? This question has come up before, and the consensus was that no significant commercial products used ESP32.

A few mentioned here.  LIFX is possibly the most notable "end user" product.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESP32#Reception_and_use

Interesting to note that u.blox NINA-W13x modules are based on ESP32.  I'm sure those end up in lots of products.

[logancane]

Thank you for your replies everyone!

The closest and most practical thing I could find to what I was after was the Cypress offering suggested by Pigrew. The TI offerings looked promising too, especially since I already have a Tiva launchpad, but unfortunately I would need seperate BT, Wi-Fi and MCU chips.

For now, I've ordered the CY8CPROTO-062-4343W dev kit which comes with a CYW43439 BT/Wi-FI chip and a PSoC 6 host MCU which are both available separately for when I want to integrate them onto a PCB with the other functionality. Infineon/Cypress has a course on BT and Wi-Fi on their github and a repo of code examples so hopefully I can work it out 

[tszaboo]

Considering you can buy their modules from Arrow in quantity, I don't have an issue selecting it for a commetial project.

[Smokey]

I had a similar sort of concern here: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/projects/professional-docs-and-toolchain-for-esp32-in-commercial-product/msg3927434/#msg3927434

[JustMeHere]

ESP32

This is product that is intended to be used reliably.