Easy, Quick, and Convenient Prototyping

Hey, real quick: Do you know how to easily hand solder a 54-SMD package (Figure 1)?

Figure 1: Hand soldering surface mount parts, like u-blox’s ZED-F9T GNSS module, for prototyping is nearly impossible. (Image source: u-blox)

Yeah, me neither.

While dealing with surface mount products isn't impossible, it can definitely be a hurdle and a hindrance. Luckily for us, I don’t need to go down the rabbit hole too deep about advanced soldering practices because there is another way: I can easily and quickly prototype on development boards.

Development boards – including products like evaluation boards, demonstration boards, and eval breakout boards – are component populated printed circuit boards that feature the main component in a convenient way. The boards feature a specific product – such as a microcontroller, sensor, push button, communication module or microphone – to explore the capability of the device. They can also be a combination of components to serve a purpose, such as communication. The boards can range from simple designs where the focus component is mounted on a PCB with convenient pinouts to complex where the board is loaded to the max with all the necessary parts such as passives, connectors, buttons, LEDs, converters and more.

A huge benefit is that these development boards are designed, populated and ready to go. The alternative of procuring the original device and approved components, designing the board and waiting for everything to arrive, can take weeks if not more (Table 1). In comparison, a development board in stock at DigiKey means you can start rapidly prototyping in as quickly as a day.

Table 1: Comparison of lead times for designing an evaluation/development board from scratch with procuring a ready-made one.

Let’s revisit my earlier question about soldering a 54-SMD package. This stemmed from my research on u-blox's ZED-F9T GNSS module -- a neat little device that offers centimeter-level accuracy.  I could spend considerable time analyzing the 54 pinouts on the datasheet, composing a BOM on MyLists, building a DKRed PCB and waiting for everything to arrive... Or I could simply buy Sparkfun’s ZED-F9T breakout board (Figure 2) - preloaded with the device and the right accessory parts - and start working on this immediately. This allows me to rapidly start working on a proof of concept exponentially quicker than starting from scratch with the device.

Figure 2: The Sparkfun ZED-F9T GNSS Timing breakout board allows for rapid evaluation of u-blox’s ZED-F9T GNSS module. (Image source: Sparkfun)

The Sparkfun product that features the u-blox module brings up another point: development boards can be produced by the manufacturer of the device or they can be produced by third party companies. Manufacturers such as STMicroelectronics, that produce STM32 microcontrollers, have a wide portfolio of development boards ranging from cost effective and simple options (such as the Nucleo boards) to more complicated and extensive evaluation boards. Learn more about the different types of ST’s STM32 prototyping hardware options here.

Third party companies – including Adafruit, Sparkfun, Seeed, MikroElektronika, and DFRobot - offer a plethora of innovative development boards to help engineers and designers hit the ground running by making the boards easy to work with and provide example projects along with hookup guides and codes to get started.

Dev board must-have's

Table 2 outlines some example development boards and their features:

Table 2: A brief description of some example development boards and their key features.

Platform essentials

Table 3 includes three popular development board platforms that designers can use for their projects.

Table 3: Some popular development board platforms.

Development boards can vary in price points, purpose, robustness and intent. Professional engineers can leverage development boards to help with quick turnaround proof of concepts (Figure 3) and help them on their journey to design the device from breakout board into their finished design.  Students, hobbyists and makers will appreciate the accessibility and price points of development boards so they can incorporate them into their designs as well.

Figure 3: Using evaluation/development boards, such as Seeed’s ETA9740 Battery Charger eval board shown here, can save a significant amount of design time. (Image source: Author created with Seeed image)

Conclusion

Whether you're a student tackling a capstone project or an R&D engineer validating a concept, few tools rival the accessibility and efficiency of a development board. These boards make rapid prototyping straightforward, helping you quickly bring ideas to life and smoothly transition from rough sketches to professional-grade solutions.