What is the smallest device you can run Nerves on?

Nerves Forum Nerves Questions / Help
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I’ve been thinking of ways to use Nerves, and was wondering - what is the smallest device or piece of hardware you can run Nerves on?

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Do you mean small in physical size or small in its computing power, memory, etc?

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Physical size :slight_smile:

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From the officially supported I think it is the pi0.

Well or QEMU Arm, as it is emulated it has no physical size itself :wink:

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the Linkit device is super small also. It had some caveats of use that i can’t quite remember tho.

And the NanoPi Neo was pretty small also, but I’ve never played with it.

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Nice - thanks both! :023:

The Raspberry Pi Zero looks tiny:

1532047485505443727.jpg800×450 41.8 KB

Specs:

  • 1GHz single-core CPU
  • 512MB RAM
  • Mini HDMI port
  • Micro USB OTG port
  • Micro USB power
  • HAT-compatible 40-pin header
  • Composite video and reset headers
  • CSI camera connector (v1.3 only)

Linkit too:

Specs:

  • Single input single output(1T1R) Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n.
  • Pin-out for GPIO, I2C, I2S, SPI, UART, PWM and Ethernet Port.
  • 580 MHz MIPS CPU.
  • 32MB flash and 128MB DDR2 RAM.
  • USB host.
  • Micro SD slot.

And here’s the NanoPi compared to a Pi0:

maxresdefault.jpg1280×720 67.2 KB

Specs:

air_en_02.jpg740×891 351 KB

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If you want something that’s going to work well and be well-supported, the RPi Zero is going to be your best bet. Some of the other options are neat and could be made to work, but you’ll be on your own or working with community systems as far as keeping the target configurations updated.

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The RPi Zero looks plenty small imo, also specs are awesome for the size.

I wasn’t even aware the RPi Zero existed tbh - was only aware of the Raspberry Pi :lol:

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This sounds like a challenge :smiley: I’d offer to ship a pi zero w for the person who manages to run Nerves on the smallest device, but I suspect @ConnorRigby already has enough :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I think the Linkit is the smallest one I’ve run it on from a pcb surface size, but it was a pain to set up.

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Note the difference between Zero and Zero W, only the latter has Wi-Fi. I have two Zero W’s for my Nerves project and they work very well. :slight_smile:

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Not sure if it’d work, but…

:lol:

Thanks @Nicd - I’m glad I didn’t order the one without the W now :101:

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built in wi-fi?

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I think so - but the size difference between it and the Raspberry Pi Zero seems minimal, so I’d personally probably go for the Pi0 given the comments in this thread :023:

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Haha, agree, @ConnorRigby would probably figure out to run Nerves on the stuff people compare the devices with -> the batteries, coins, etc…

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I did just cook an rpi0w a couple weeks ago… :slight_smile: