Pycom LoPy4 IoT Dev Board - BLE, WiFi, LoRa & Sigfox

When it comes to modifications and upgrades in Electronics, equipping old projects with wireless capabilities is certainly one of the more satisfying things to do, as wireless not only allows for more freedom for your projects – letting you install them discrete or faraway locations – but it can also offer the extra feature of making it compatible with modern tech and a few handy applications. This is what gets us so excited for the Pycom LoPy4 IoT Dev Board, which is part of the Pycom LPWAN Range (Low Power Wide Area Network) and features BLE, WiFi, LoRa & Sigfox, making it a quad-carrier that blends the best of short, mid and long range communications into one tiny, powerful and extremely versatile IoT Development Board.

Four Communications Protocols on One Tiny Board!

The Pycom LoPy4 IoT Dev Board is a step above the rest, and offers a beautiful blend of some very awesome wireless protocols to support Makers who really like to experiment, prototype and build. It offers Bluetooth for low-range constant data transmission, WiFi for mid-range reliable communications on existing networks, and then both LoRa and Sigfox for much longer ranges at lower data rates, and when working in unison, these protocols make the LoPy4 one of the most versatile IoT Development Boards around.

Additionally, the multiple Communications protocols also really helps for interoperability, allowing for a tracker in a vehicle, for example, to transmit tiny, infrequent packets to gateways and nodes when on the road, connect to local area networks to update schedules when arriving at depots, and even connecting to a close-range Bluetooth diagnostics during maintenance. This can all be achieved with one central board when using the LoPy4, and this is just one example from many that demonstrate just how valuable multiple communications protocols can be. So now let’s take a closer look at these protocols, and how they actually benefit you as a Maker who loves to build cool projects:

• Bluetooth & WiFi – Although Bluetooth and WiFi are probably two of the most popular wireless communications protocols around, they are certainly always welcome on any development board. And while the other wireless comm’s that this board is capable of are definitely fancy, Bluetooth and WiFi open up great opportunities for interacting and integrating with more commonplace devices and modules. Furthermore, with support for Bluetooth BLE as well as Bluetooth 4.2 BR/EDR, it can be used for simple low-power transmissions, or can be stepped up for streaming audio and other data too.
  
  
• LoRaWAN – With so many different yet similar wireless protocols all gaining popularity in various niches, it can be tough to differentiate them sometimes. Fortunately, LoRa is a specialised protocol that helped grow the interest in LPWAN (Low Power Wide Area Network) by offering Long Range Wide Area Networks at an impressively low power level. This has been amazing at assisting Makers with creating large networks for IoT, featuring high data rates at close ranges, and low data rates at longer ranges – making it quite versatile depending on how you want to use it.
  
  
• Sigfox – With the rising popularity of LPWAN, Sigfox has been a rather recent addition to the niche, and has introduced an incredibly long-range wireless communication protocol that focuses purely on low frequency, small transmissions at an extremely long range. This is perfect for IoT applications like vehicle fleet tracking, agriculture, service monitoring and metering, as well as other use cases that only need to transmit data up to 24 times a day. It is typically designed to stay in deep sleep until it needs to kick into action, allowing for a long lifespan, and is usually one-way communication unless specified otherwise for specific purposes.

Typical Applications for the Pycom LoPy4 IoT Dev Board:

With four distinctly advantageous wireless protocols equipped on one board, coupled of course with a good level of processing power, the LoPy4 is quite versatile in its functionality. However, with this specific set of protocols, the LoPy4 is actually very well suited to applications like vehicle fleet monitoring across a wide area, intercommunications within a home automation system, tracking and timestamping of personnel within a business, or other projects that require a mix of protocols to communicate in different ways depending on the scenario.

Additionally, the impressive level of versatility of the LoPy4 also makes it ideal for prototyping a fresh new project, testing out various comm’s methods, figuring out which is best for the project, and then swapping this board out with one that better specialises in the task you need your project to do. This way, you can really get the absolute best solution for whatever project you’re making, and instead of having to program multiple different boards and testing them with various compatible modules, this board can help you figure it all out in a simply, easy way instead.

Additional Resources:

• One of the best things about Pycom is that they are very community-focused, and have a handy Pycom Documentation Hub, where you can find datasheets, pinout diagrams, tutorials, guides, firmware and other handy resources.
  
  
• Finally, if you’re still stuck or looking for answers after reviewing the datasheet and other resources, the Pycom Official Forum is the place to go, where you can ask questions, share ideas and get help with troubleshooting.
  
  
• Although we usually like to provide a nice review video at the end of large descriptions like this, we couldn’t find a good quality review, and as such, instead we’re including this great video of a Pycom LoPy4 LoRaWAN Project Tutorial, which utilises the Pycom LoPy4 to automate an important function on a large farm setting – which we feel is a great use case for the low power wide area capabilities of this board.