The arrival of Bluetooth 5 was a significant leap forward for the IoT developer community, especially with its new Bluetooth Mesh functionality, which connects more devices and more sensors. Nearly four billion devices are expected to be shipped with Bluetooth technology in 2018. Bluetooth is driving innovation and creating new markets for wireless audio, wearables, tracking assets, building automation, lighting, sensor farms, etc… With a design based on the Nordic nRF52832 SoC, combining a low power 64 MHz ARM Cortex-M4F and the 2.4 GHz radio in a single chip, the BLYST Nano SoM (System on Module) is the perfect way to catch this new Bluetooth IoT wave driven by both Bluetooth 5 and Bluetooth Mesh.

• The BLYST Nano is low power and small enough, at 10 x 7 x 1.6 mm, for wearable and sensor applications.
• With 30 programmable I/O pins, it's versatile enough to fit any control and automation application.
• With a hardware floating point unit, algorithms can be directly implemented on the device, allowing more realtime sensor fusion processing.
• It is a complete System on Module with all required components (crystals, coils, DC/DC, etc.) built-in and ready to use. So you don't need to take up more board space with add-on components needed to support a given module.

BLYST Nano Module Features

• Built-in ceramic antenna
• Built-in coils for low power DC/DC mode
• Built-in 32 MHz & 32.768 MHz crystal for low power
• Dimensions: 10 x 7 x 1.6 mm
• No extra PCB spaces or any external components required on users' application board
• All I/O pins of the nRF52832 are exposed to pads around the edges of the module to take full advantage of the nRF52832 and for easy assembly without compromise
• FCC & CE certified

BLYST Nano Open Source Software Development Resources

There are lots of software developement resources available for the nRF52832. It is well supported by the open source community, from beginning Arduino users to more advanced progammers. The Micropython port is also available for the BLYST Nano based boards.

• BLYST Nano documentation
• IDAP-Link documentation & software
• Nordic Bluetooth 5 SDK download
• Nordic Bluetooth Mesh SDK
• Nordic developer forum
• Setting up Eclipse GCC based firmware development environment
• Setting up the Arduino development environment
• Get started with Bluetooth firmware programming
• Micropython port for the BLYST Nano

nRF52832 Features

• Single chip, highly flexible, 2.4 GHz multi-protocol SoC
• 32-bit ARM Cortex-M4F Processor
• 1.7 V to 3.6 V operation
• 512 kB flash + 64 kB RAM
• Supports concurrent Bluetooth low energy/ANT protocol operation
• On-chip NFC tag for Out-of-Band (OOB) pairing
• Up to +4 dBm output power
• -96 dBm sensitivity, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)
• Thread safe and run-time protected
• Event driven API
• On air compatible with nRF24L and nRF24AP series
• 2 data rates (2 Mbps/1 Mbps)
• PPI - maximum flexibility for power-efficient applications and code simplification
• Automated power management system with automatic power management of each peripheral
• Configurable I/O mapping for analog and digital I/O
• 3 x Master/Slave SPI
• 2 x Two-wire interface (I²C)
• UART (RTS/CTS)
• 3 x PWM
• AES HW encryption
• 12-bit ADC
• Real Time Counter (RTC)
• Digital microphone interface (PDM)

Processing Power

The nRF52832 incorporates a powerful Cortex-M4F processor enabling the most demanding applications with complex arithmetic requirements to be realized in a single chip solution. The IC supports DSP instructions, a Floating Point Unit (FPU), single-cycle multiply and accumulate, and hardware divide for energy-efficient processing of computationally complex operations.

Multiprotocol Radio

The 2.4 GHz radio supports multiple protocols including Bluetooth Low Energy, ANT, and 2.4 GHz proprietary. The radio has high definition RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication) and highly automated functionality, including EasyDMA for direct memory access during packet send and retrieve. Nordic provides protocol stacks for Bluetooth Low Energy. ANT protocol stacks are available directly from ANT.

Power Efficiency

The nRF52832 SoC is an extremely power efficient device that can run from a supply that provides 1.7 V to 3.6 V. All individual peripherals and clocks can flexibly power down when not required for task operation, thus minimizing power consumption. The IC has a comprehensive system of automated and adaptive power management features. These features range across the entire IC’s operation, from power supply switching to peripheral bus/EasyDMA memory management, to automated shut down of all but the absolute essential peripherals required to perform a task.

On-chip NFC Tag

NFC™-A tag support is included on-chip. Out-of-Band (OOB) pairing using NFC simplifies the process of authenticated pairing between two Bluetooth devices by exchanging authentication information over an NFC link.

Sensor Board

The Sensor Board pledge level

The Sensor Board is a 34 mm diameter round board pre-assembled with a BLYST Nano module. It has a suite of sensors on-board including: temperature, humidity, pressure, air quality, and motion sensing. And it has all the components you’d need to run a stand-alone sensor node with data logging.

Features

• BLYST Nano comes assembled on the board
• Bosch BME680 - Temperature, Humidity, Pressure, Gas (Air Quality index)
• ICM-20948 - 9 axis IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) for acceleration, gyroscope, and compass sensors with on-chip digital motion processor to offload computation of motion processing algorithms
• Breakout pins for NFC, I/O, UART, a buzzer
• EEPROM
• Flash memory
• RGB LED
• Two pushbuttons
• Battery retainer for CR2450

Breakout Board

The Breakout Board

The Breakout Board is designed to make it easy for you to build prototypes by breaking out all 30 I/O pins and adding some LED indicators and easy pushbuttons.

• BLYST Nano comes assembled to the board
• Two user-defined pushbuttons
• Three user-defined LEDs
• Pads for a coin-cell battery holder (not included) - using ML-621S batteries
• Standard 2.54 mm (.100 inch) holes for headers (not included)

IDAP-Link CMSIS-DAP Debug JTAG

The IDAP-LinkTM is a low cost CMSIS-DAP JTAG debug probe with enhanced features. It does a lot more than just debugging. The unit appears as a USB disk drive on the host computer. This allows firmware flashing easily by copying the firmware file over without requiring any special flashing software and will work instantly with Windows, Linux & OSX operating systems. It provides a UART to USB bridge for communication between the target device and the PC. It also provides regulated 3.3 V power to directly power the target device over USB without an additional power source.

Features

• Supports both SWD & JTAG mode
• Debug compatibility with most IDEs such as Keil, CrossWorks, Eclipse, etc..
• Onboard 3.3 V regulator to power the target device
• UART to USB bridge for communication between target and PC up to three MBaud
• Firmware flashing by simple drag & drop file copy
• microSD slot for flash programming without a PC

Flashing software for Nordic nRF5x series

• Parallel flashing software for gang programming
• Full support readback protection
• Flashing Softdevice + App + DFU without requiring mergehex

Download IDAP-Link software & documentation

How BLYST Nano Compares

Shipping Details

Crowd Supply will be shipping all orders from their warehouse in Mansfield, Texas. For more information on shipping and fulfillment logistics, see The Crowd Supply Guide. You can see the status of your order by logging in to your Crowd Supply account.