Raspberry Pi Pico 2 vs Original Pico: What’s New?

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2024-08-08 | By Travis Foss

Following the remarkable success of the original RP2040 microcontroller, Raspberry Pi has developed and launched a new version of its Pico microcontroller board - the Pico 2. This latest version is powered by the new RP2350 microcontroller platform, designed in-house at Raspberry Pi.

The Pico 2 offers significant performance upgrades over the original Pico. It features a 150 MHz system clock, compared to the 133 MHz of the original Pico. It also boasts dual Arm Cortex-M33 cores, as opposed to the RP2040’s dual Arm Cortex-M0+, plus the new RP2350 has dual RISC-V Hazard3 cores. The RAM on the Pico 2 has nearly doubled from the original Pico, now including 520KB of RAM compared to the original 264KB. Additionally, the amount of on-board QSPI Flash memory has been doubled from 2MB to 4MB on this new board. The Pico 2 also features 8KB of Antifuse OTP for key storage, a hardware TRNG, and fast glitch detectors. The documentation for the Pico 2 outlines all these security features, allowing professional users to integrate the RP2350 and Pico 2 without any restrictions.

Raspberry Pi Pico 2 vs Original Pico: What’s New?

The Pico 2 boasts software compatibility with the Pico 1 and enhances power efficiency, making it an excellent choice for upgrading any Pico project. As with the original, the Pico 2 supports C/C++ or MicroPython. The advanced capabilities of the Pico 2 make it an ideal choice for a wide range of projects, from robotics and drones to innovative IoT devices. When considering your next project, the Pico 2 should definitely be at the top of your list.

Raspberry Pi Pico 2 vs Original Pico: What’s New?