Pi Pico W with the Arduino IDE | Using WiFi

Use the new Pico W with the Arduino IDE instead of microPython!

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On June 30, 2022, Raspberry Pi announced the latest iteration of it’s RP2040-based Pico microcontroller. The Pico W has the same pinout and form factor as the original Pico and has WiFi capabilities.

Raspberry Pi also released a new UF2 file and several samples using microPython with the new WiFi chip. However, although they did release a C++ SDK, there was no update to the Arduino IDE for the new microcontroller.

But you CAN use the Pico W with the Arduino IDE by using a new boards manager file that covers virtually every RP2040-based board. And today, I’ll show you how to install that for the classic Arduino IDE 1.8 and the newer IDE 2.0.

After installing the new boards manager, we’ll give it a test. Then we’ll see how we can use the new WiFi features to control LEDs and servo motors with a web-based interface.

Here is the Table of Contents for today's video:

00:00 - Introduction
03:25 - Raspberry Pi Pico W
08:05 - Bluetooth issues?
10:55 - Pico W vs. ESP32
13:35 - Installing the Boards Manager
18:22 - Blink test
20:48 - WiFi Network Scan
23:10 - Using the WiFi Library
28:07 - Using Web Data
30:56 - Pico W LED Control
37:43 - Pico W Servo Control
47:28 - Conclusion

The Arduino IDE is a popular interface for programming microcontrollers, and now we can use it with the Pico W.

Hope you enjoy the video!

Bill