Planet Arduino

If you’re looking for an ever faster, smoother, and more rewarding way to build your own IoT projects at home, the new MKR IoT Carrier Rev2 could be perfect for you.

The new carrier can work with any board from the MKR family, giving you a wide choice of connectivity options to match the needs of your next IoT project. With the MKR IoT Carrier Rev2 you don’t need any additional components to get started, and you can build impressive and complete hassle free projects this way.

What does the carrier include? You’ll get all the sensors and actuators you need to build IoT projects and connect them to the internet, taking your home automation journey to the next level.

Let’s take a quick look at what you can build with the MKR IoT Carrier Rev2 and any board from the MKR family.

• Environment monitoring stations. The new carrier comes with sensors that allow you to map and measure various things in the world around you — temperature, humidity, air quality, barometric pressure, and more. You can also track the movement of the board. For even more sensory awareness, you can connect analog or I2C grove compatible modules to the grove connectors. You can store the data you collect in the SD card or send it directly to the Arduino IoT Cloud.

• GUI IoT interface. Visualizing your data is incredibly important — and the Rev2 comes with its own OLED color display, allowing you to create your own navigation menus. You can also use the included LEDs and buzzer for feedback.

• Connect to and control external devices. The IoT is all about networks, and with the Rev2 you can control electronic devices up to 24 Volts using the two on-board relays. You can do this manually — like switching your reading lamp on or off via the Arduino IoT Cloud Remote app, or you can set the lamp to behave according to sensor data like the light levels in the room.

The MKR IoT Carrier vs the MKR IoT Carrier Rev2 — what’s the difference?

There are a few key differences between the Rev2 and the previous version of the MKR IoT Carrier. Here are the main ones.

Some sensors have changed:

• The humidity sensor (HTS221) and barometric pressure sensor (LP22HB)  has been replaced with the BME6688 sensor.
• The IMU (LSM6DS3) was replaced with LSM6DSOX.

Following customer feedback some other components have been repositioned:

• Addition of a handy reset button
• 90° rotation of the relay connectors
• Repositioning of the light sensor (APDS-9960)
• Change of pins assigned to control the relays to pins 1 and 2
• Change grove connector assignment from pin A5 to A6 

Do I have to change my sketch if I have been using the first revision of the MKR IoT Carrier?

No — the MKR IoT Carrier library works with both revisions of the carrier. Just make sure to use the latest version of the library to ensure everything goes smoothly.

Have more fun with the IoT

The new MKR IoT Carrier Rev2 is the perfect tool to get started having fun with your own IoT projects, or to take your IoT tinkering to the next level. You don’t need a ton of experience, a bucket of expensive components, or endless hours of free time to build your own satisfying, useful IoT gadgets at home.

The post Introducing the new MKR IoT Carrier Rev2: Time to start your next IoT project appeared first on Arduino Blog.

Start the year with a new Arduino hardware component. Or two, or three! Dozens of our products are currently discounted at 20% for our annual winter sale. Just head over to the Arduino store and pick out all the modules, shields and carriers that fit your needs.

We even have the MKR IoT Carrier and full MKR IoT Bundle on sale, to help you make 2022 the year of your first Internet of Things project. There are all kinds of connectivity available, from LoRa to GSM and NB communication, so you can get to work on a connected project that hooks straight up to Arduino Cloud, too.

So what are you waiting for? They’re selling out fast. 

Stock up on the hardware you need at 20% off, and don’t forget to share all the projects you create with your Winter Sale loot using the hashtag #arduinoproject and #madewitharduino! 

The post Have you checked out our winter sale? appeared first on Arduino Blog.

By popular demand, we are pleased to announce that it’s now possible to buy the Arduino MKR IoT Carrier. Originally forming a key part of the Arduino Oplá IoT Kit, we’ve responded to our community to make the carrier available on it’s own, thus enabling you to benefit from having a bunch of sensors, actuators and a display all featured on the one board — making it quicker and easier to take your IoT projects to the next level.

Featuring a large set of built-in sensors and actuators as well as a useful color display, the carrier lets you focus on prototyping your IoT ideas right away by saving on the hassle of wiring and soldering these components.  

The carrier can become a WiFi, LoRa, NB-IoT or GSM-compatible device by seamlessly connecting to any MKR family board. Building a user interface for these boards is easy with the embedded color OLED screen, five capacitive touch buttons, and the five RGB LEDs. The integrated sensors (temperature, humidity, pressure, RGBC light, gesture and proximity) allow you to map the environment around the carrier, and should you need to capture any other data there are over 100 additional Grove sensors that can easily be connected directly to the carrier.

Here’s are quick demo of the carrier’s capabilities! (Special shout out to Mirko Pacioni and Fill Connesso for creating this demo.)

Capture and store all the data locally on an SD card, or connect your MKR family board to the IoT Cloud for real-time data captured, storage, and visualization.

The MKR IoT Carrier features:

• Round OLED display
• Five RGB LEDs
• Five capacitive touch buttons
• On-board sensors (temperature, humidity, pressure, RGBC light, gesture and proximity)
• Buzzer
• IMU (Three-axis accelerometer sensor and three-axis gyroscope sensor)
• Two 24V relays
• MicroSD card holder (SD card not included)
• Plug-and-play Grove connectors for external sensors — two analog and one digital (I2C)
• 18650 Li-ion rechargeable battery holder (battery not included)

The MKR IoT Carrier is now available to purchase from the Arduino online store for €48 / $57.60 — find infinite possibilities for all your IoT projects

Interested in learning how to build IoT projects, then we have the perfect choice of kits for you, both featuring the MKR IoT Carrier. The Arduino Explore IoT Kit is the ideal kit to learn about the Internet of Things and what you can do with it, while the Arduino Oplá IoT Kit is great for experiencing the benefits of IoT at home or in the office with eight out-of-the-box IoT projects controlled on the Arduino IoT Cloud.