EYE on NPI – nRF5340 Audio Development Kit #EYEonNPI #DigiKey @NordicTweets @digikey @Adafruit

This week’s EYE ON NPI is chillin’ and listening to some vibin’ beats – we’re featuring Nordic’s jam-packed nRF5340 Audio Development Kit.

This kit will get you going fast with Bluetooth Low Energy audio development with a lovely kit that has everything you need to build both basic and advanced BTLE audio demos that exercise all the new capabilities of BT 4.x and 5.x’s native audio streaming technology.

Audio was one of the first killer app’s for Bluetooth adoption. Who doesn’t remember when ubiquitous ‘hands-free’ headsets started popping up in every business guy’s ear. For mobile devices, these headsets turned out be quick to pair, and allowed people to talk, or listen to music, while driving or working without wires.

Bluetooth classic audio is still incredibly popular today: not just used in headsets but also in Bluetooth speakers, hearing aids, wireless mics, home voice agents, and more!

When the audio profile was first invented, there were a few, totally reasonable restrictions placed on how it was used. First, it’s a point-to-point connection – also called source-sink connection. There’s a supplier source of audio – say the MP3 player – and a destination sink like a speaker. Second, the compression codec had to match the processor and battery capabilities of late 90’s technology. The first classic codec was called SBC, although recently there are newer codecs that can do a better job with reducing lossyness and, of course, can take advantage of the Moore’s-law improvements in memory and processor capabilities. Unfortunately, as one can expect in such a technology space, many of the codecs are patented, licensed, and require per-device fees. Also, unless you know what to look for, it’s harder to compare two headsets with different codecs, as another variable that affects audio quality and delay.

While many non-audio/non-keyboard devices have thankfully moved from BT classic to BTLE, mostly in order to avoid Apple’s MFI program, there’s been a bit of a lag in getting audio devices to switch over from classic to LE due to the high inertia of technological laziness.

However, in the last few years, a Really Good Reason to move over has been invented: AirPods! Yep, when Apple came out with their new wireless Bluetooth earbuds, they had to come up with a custom BTLE protocol – because there’s two sinks and one source, and even if you created two connections (one for left and one for right) the source would have to work hard to synchronize audio. Sure Apple can put the time and money into that kind of development, but what about everyone else who wanted to make similar products?

That’s why when BTLE audio came ‘free’ with multi-point transmission and synchronization and an improved free codec, folks’ ears started perking up.

With Nordic’s new nRF5340 ADK, creating advanced BTLE Audio applications is super fast. The nRF5340 is a dual core ARM processor, which means it’s easy to have one core dedicated to codec management and DMA audio streaming, and the other core for interfacing and control. The free software examples come with two main demos right now: a synchronous example for making wireless earbuds, and a broadcast example for sending audio to multiple sinks. Note that for these examples you’ll often want two ADKs so you can stream audio to both ADKs as a way to mimic earbuds, for example.

And, have you heard the good news? Digi-key has a TON of the nRF5340 Audio Development Kit in stock right now for immediate shipment. Each ADK has all the accessory hardware needed to immediately bootstrap your BTLE example project. (Hint, it’s also a great dev board for general nRF5340 development, with SD card, built in debugger, power management, Arduino-esque headers, RGB LEDs, and user interface buttons. Pick up two of these dev kits today and you can be jammin’ and boppin’ by tomorrow afternoon!


Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Join Adafruit on Mastodon

Adafruit is on Mastodon, join in! adafruit.com/mastodon

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 36,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


Maker Business — “Packaging” chips in the US

Wearables — Enclosures help fight body humidity in costumes

Electronics — Transformers: More than meets the eye!

Python for Microcontrollers — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: Silicon Labs introduces CircuitPython support, and more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Guardian Robot, Weather-wise Umbrella Stand, and more!

Microsoft MakeCode — MakeCode Thank You!

EYE on NPI — Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — #NewProds 7/19/23 Feat. Adafruit Matrix Portal S3 CircuitPython Powered Internet Display!

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.