There is always JLCPCB. They will make anything you want for about 40 cents plus parts.
It is not simple to design a microcontroller board from scratch, but what I’ve done is use the Pi Pico as if it was a giant chip. Make a board that has connectors and optical isolation, and so on, and then the Pico just plugs in. Here is the first one of these I made, or rather had JLCPCB make for me. It is a stupid-simple design, as all it adds is some connectors and four mounting holes. But I think you can see that I could have added more. I did that for only one pin because I needed more current, so I added a 2N2222. At their prices it makes sense to mmake an entire PCB, just because you want connectors and mounting holes. I use KiCAD for the design work. KiCAD is free and open source. https://github.com/chrisalbertson/NeatoLidarInterfacePCB You send in your design files, and they make five PCBs for $2. They will also solder on parts from a short list for the cost of the part, many parts at less than 1 cent. (Wholesale prices for components in China are really cheap.). https://jlcpcb.com/ How do they keep the cost so low? Not by using cheap labor but by using no labor. > On Oct 19, 2025, at 3:26 AM, Viesturs Lācis <[email protected]> wrote: > > sestd., 2025. g. 18. okt., plkst. 03:24 — lietotājs Chris Albertson > (<[email protected]>) rakstīja: >> >> https://www.seeedstudio.com/Raspberry-Pi-Pico-p-4832.html >> Raspberry Pi Pico - Raspberry Pi RP2040 chip, beginner-friendly >> microcontroller, small & flexible design, low power consumption >> seeedstudio.com >> > > Thank you, the price really looks sweet! What I am missing is that I > was hoping to stumble on some list of compatible accessories - some > screen (to display 5-6 digits) and some optoisolator / transistor > shield board for few inputs/outputs. I did find this: > https://www.seeedstudio.com/Grove-Shield-for-Pi-Pico-v1-0-p-4846.html > but that seems like a simple breakout board without any protective > measures. > > Viesturs > > > _______________________________________________ > Emc-users mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
