LILYGO Launches New LoRa, Display, ePaper, and CAN Bus Boards, All Powered by Espressif's ESP32-S3
Low-frequency LoRa, a tempting target for Meshtastic, an ultra-wide touch display with motion sensing — there's a lot of project ideas here.
Embedded and hobbyist electronics specialist LILYGO has announced a raft of new microcontroller development boards, each targeting different niches: a low-frequency LoRa board, an ultra-widescreen display board, a LoRa-equipped ePaper display board, and a CAN bus board.
The four new entries in LILYGO's portfolio of devices, brought to our attention by Linux Gizmos, are: the T-Beam BPF, a compact battery-powered board built around an Espressif ESP32-S3 microcontroller and Semtech SX1278 LoRa transceiver; the T-Display Bar, which puts the Espressif ESP32-S3 to work driving an on-board ultra-widescreen 2.25" full-color capacitive display; the T-Mini ePaper S3 with a 1.02" electrophoretic display and LoRa transceiver; and the T-2CAN, designed for CAN bus work.
The T-Beam BPF, to start with, offers two Tensilica Xtensa LX7 cores running at up to 240MHz, 8MB of pseudo-static RAM (PSRAM), and 16MB of program flash, plus a battery holder on the rear linked in to a X-Powers AXP2101 power management chip. There's a 128×64 0.96" OLED display at the top, plus on-board Quectel L76K Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receiver and Semtech SX1278 LoRa transceiver — but those looking for compatibility with existing LoRa setups will need to take care, as this particular board uses the longer-rage lower-frequency 144–148MHz frequency band rather than the more usual 868MHz and 915MHz bands.
The T-Display Bar is a gumstick-style development board whose footprint is designed to hide behind an ultra-widescreen 2.25" full-color RGB IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen display with a 76×284 resolution, connected over an SPI bus to the Espressif ESP32-S3 behind. Elsewhere in the board is a Bosch Sensortech BHI260AP "smart sensor" inertial measurement unit (IMU), which includes a machine learning core designed for on-sensor activity detection without involving the host processor.
The T-Mini ePaper S3 is almost certain to end up as a target device for the community-driven Meshtastic mesh network project, featuring a compact design with a power-sipping 1.02" 128×80 monochrome electrophoretic display — sunlight-readable and requiring power only when changing states. Inside the housing is another ESP32-S3, naturally, plus a battery holder, while there's a Semtech SX1262 LoRa transceiver for connectivity and a holder for an 18350-format battery — not supplied with the kit.
Finally, the T-2CAN offers — what else? — an Espressif ESP32-S3 microcontroller on a board dedicated to automotive and industrial CAN bus projects. The board hosts a Microchip MCP2515 CAN bus controller, providing support for two CAN v2.0B connections at rates of up to 1Mb/s with six 29-bit filters and two 29-bit masks. There's a USB Type-C connector for data and power, plus screw terminals for a 5–12VDC power input.
All models are now listed on the LILYGO store, though most were showing as out of stock at the time of writing. The T-Beam BPF is priced at $56.34; the T-Display Bar at $27.36; the T-Mini ePaper S3 at $40.81; and the T-2CAN at $24.36.