Badger2350 Insights

Support
1

So after playing around some time with my new Badger2350, here are some insights.

Hardware

The best you can get for a small RP2350 based e-Ink display. It is not perfect though. For example the Badger2350 lost the smart power management electronics compared to the Badger2040W. The latter had a current draw of 27µA@3.6V, while the new version draws 167µA@3.6V. Still very good and the claimed 100 days of standby is very conservative. I guess it could well be more than 200 days.

What is also missing is a connector for a few GPIOs. I won’t use the Badger2350 as a batch, so I really miss that. But the GPIO-connector was already lost going from the 2040 to the 2040W variant.

The PC-case is great, and very simple to disassemble. I hope some days the design-files will show up so it is easy to print some alternative (color) variants.

The only thing I don’t like on hardware side is the LiPo glued to the PCB.

Software

While the hardware is premier league, the software is a mixed bag. The low-level implementation of the power-management making use of the POWMAN-functions of the RP2350 is great. But only if you stick to Pimoroni MicroPython. If you use Arduino, PlatformIO or C with the SDK you will have a hard time making use of low-power applications. Ok, you can make it with a lot of copy&paste using the C-code behind the MicroPython implementation, but this is not straightforward.

Also, on UI side I am missing something for more advanced users. Please, please add LVGL support as an option. Lines, rectangles, stars and so on are ok for basic usage, but the function set is no where near the pro-level of the hardware.

Having said this, what you get as software is good to get you started. And as long as you stay in this very small niche ecosystem and don’t want to share code with a larger community, that is ok.

2 Likes
2

…is this something you could make use of for some LVGL fun?

I see this covers the Pico under the keyword „rp2“…

3

Yes, this is a MicroPython port with integrated LVGL. But that does not help if you need the Pimoroni MicroPython for their hardware-support.

4

I understand that Pimoroni is needed for an adaption layer between LVGL and their HW.

Actually, I create the UIs myself until now using my own libraries, which of course are highly device dependent and customized, but shown bars, sliders, pop-ups and windows as well. I do see the advantage of LVGL, which I was not aware of as of now…

In addition, I see that most of the LVGL stuff is in C. Another advantage of a Pimoroni adaption would be to have this fully integrated into the Python world, at least on programming level - knowing that fast routines would be anyways in C again. But this would be under the hood and not visible to the programmer….

So, I would also support your ask to Pimoroni to deal with it…

Maybe with would not only valid for the badgeware series, but also for the Interstate75 world and other display families…

1 Like