Hunter Adams listened to some really cool ideas in his latest raspberry pi business.Using our favorite microcontroller, his Raspberry Pi Pico, he manages to AM radio transmitter with RP2040This project is a great example of how versatile this microcontroller can be when you implement the right accessories with a little ingenuity.
Adams kindly shared a demo video of his setup with impressive results. He also dives deep into hardware configuration and how to recreate it in his home. It works by taking audio input from the microphone, processing it, sending it to Pico and sending it on a carrier wave.
Please note that depending on where you live, it may or may not be legal to reproduce this project.In some areas a license is required to broadcast radio signals. . If you want to build something similar, take the time to check the legality of this project before you get out your soldering iron.
If you decide it’s acceptable to reproduce this at home, you’ll need a small piece of hardware to get started. Of course, if you don’t want to permanently solder your connections, you’ll need a Raspberry Pico with headers. Adams also uses an ADC FIFO module to process the microphone input. It helps to have some jumper wires on hand and a radio nearby to test the results of your setup.
According to Adams, the RP2040 samples the input from the microphone at 10,000 Hz. This audio is he compressed into 8-bit format before being sent to the ADC FIFO. A DMA channel is used to send the samples to his PWM channel. The setup is designed with peripherals so you don’t have to use Pico’s CPU.
If you want to recreate this Raspberry Pi project yourself, check out the video shared. Youtube Take a closer look at how it works and see a demo of a real project.
