Maker Mehrdad Majzoobi has launched an open supply design for an M.2 M-key to A/E-key adapter board — supposed to make it simpler to chop-and-change between Non-Risky Reminiscence Specific (NVMe) and machine studying/synthetic intelligence accelerators on the Raspberry Pi 5.
“It’s irritating that we have to purchase a separate PCIe HAT/HAB [Hardware Attached on Top/Hardware Attached on Bottom Raspberry Pi 5 add-on] for utilizing AI accelerators (Google Coral, Hailo, and so forth.) or WiFi playing cards that don’t use the identical M.2 M-key connector as NVMe drives,” Majzoobi explains. “This additionally makes swapping out the PCIe HAT to make use of [Raspberry] Pi 5 with non-storage units painful. So I designed an open supply easy adapter that permits you to join any A/E-key playing cards to most Raspberry Pi PCIe HATs/HABs made for storage.”
A brand new open-hardware adapter board (prime) makes the M.2 M-key slot on most Raspberry Pi PCIe add-ons a little bit extra versatile. (📷: Ubo Pod)
The board itself is fairly simple: there are not any lively parts, merely an edge connector for insertion right into a Raspberry Pi 5’s M.2 HAT or comparable accent exposing an M.2 M-key slot and an A/E-key slot for the system to be tailored — with machine studying and synthetic accelerator modules prime of the checklist, however different M.2-format PCI Specific modules are additionally appropriate.
“Saving cash was not the explanation I designed this,” Majzoobi says, compared to off-the-shelf equivalents costing as little as $2 every, “however you can also make this for lower than $1 [per unit] at 100pcs. Usually I belief issues that I design myself greater than one thing tremendous low cost on AliExpress, specifically if takes me a short while to design. I guarantee I comply with all routing tips for PCIe excessive pace traces and stress take a look at my designs afterwards.”
Extra info is out there in Majzoobi’s Reddit submit, whereas the design recordsdata can be found within the Ubo Pod {hardware} repository on GitHub below the reciprocal GNU Basic Public License 3 — the place it is used to supply straightforward swapping between NVMe storage and AI acceleration on the underside of an Ubo Pod unit.
