Elecrow’s new CrowPanel Advanced is now available to buy, offering a useful piece of kit to smart home enthusiasts with an inclination to build their own smart display.
What is the CrowPanel Advanced?
Hosting a RISC-V based ESP32-P4NRW32, this 7-inch smart display is essentially an upgraded version of Elecrow’s mini computer monitor (intended for Raspberry Pi and similar boards). The key difference that sets it apart and makes it suitable for smart home and IoT applications is the support for an optional wireless module.
Three of these are available, with the ESP32-H2 module intended for Thread, Zigbee, and Matter.
The on-board storage is 16MB Flash and 32MB PSRAM, and the barebones panel also has dual USB-C ports (UART adapter/USB 2.0 OTG) and a 40-pin GPIO.
Meanwhile, Wi-Fi 6 and BLE are built-in, and the board ways just 450 grams, making it suitable for easy wall-mounting.
In addition, the CrowPanel Advanced can be bought with an optional 8MP camera.
A touchscreen panel for the smart home or office
With an IPS display with capacitive touchscreen and 1024x600 resolution, the CrowPanel Advanced offers an intriguing possibility for what they call smart home “tinkerers.”
The architecture supports machine learning and real-time analysis, making this all-on-one board useful for controlling industrial machines as well as smart homes. It’s an affordable piece of kit, too, making its integration across various locations affordable with the right implementation policy. You can also expect support for multiple development environments.
For home use, the CrowPanel Advanced certainly has its place, but if you’re not technically adept, it would be smarter to rely on a panel like the Echo Show 8.
Other options for the Elecrow CrowPanel Advanced
Thread and Zigbee can be added to the display panel with the ESP32-H2 module, but this is just one of several that can be purchased for the CrowPanel Advanced.
The SX1262 LoRa low-powered radio module reconfigures the CrowPanel Advanced as an IoT-focused control device. Meanwhile, the nRF2401 module option facilitates wireless communication with Arduino boards.
All of this makes the CrowPanel Advanced a good all-round smart home, IoT, and automation project board and display panel. We’re mostly interested in its potential as part of a Matter smart home, but really, there are endless possibilities with this device.
The Elecrow CrowPanel Advanced is available to order on Amazon, or direct from Elecrow if you want to browse through all the expansion options.
