I see a couple of threads talking about using a Pico 2W in the PicoCalc, but they’re mostly old and were before even the version of PicoMite on my current, Pico-H model.
I’ve just bought a Pico 2W module from The Pi Hut here in the UK, and I’d love to swap it over, but I’ve no idea what I need to do to it afterwards.
The current version on my machine is PicoMite MMBasic RP2040 Edition V6.00.02 RC23 but the forum threads are all before RC9, I can’t find the RC23 release anywhere, I don’t know if the Pico 2W has the same version on release, and TBH, the instructions are not really clear to me - I’m running an Apple silicon MacBook Pro, to add another complication.
Would there be some clear instructions I can’t find? Or could anyone put together such a thing?
there are two types of the Pico chip, RP2040 and RP2350. they’re used in 1 and 2 boards respectively. W boards of either kind use the same chip, but have a wireless chip added to the I/O.
what this means is that any firmware built for 2040 will run on a 1 or 1W, any for 2350 will run on 2 or 2W. of course, wireless features will not work on non-wireless boards, and firmware is (usually) built wireless-specific because there is no (good) way to determine at runtime whether or not a board has the wireless hardware added.
so, for a 2W, any firmware marked for use with 2, 2W or 2350 will work. firmwares marked 1, 1W or 2040 will not, simple as that
broadly speaking, the instructions for what you’re looking for (installing a new firmware on your fresh 2W, i assume) are to just hold down the BOOTSEL button on your board, and while you’re holding it, plugging the USB cable to your computer. the Pico will show up as a removable mass storage media, and you simply drag the firmware’s UF2 file to it. whatever happens after that depends on what the firmware is
i recommend using UF2 Loader release so that you can swap different firmwares stored on your SD card directly from the picocalc without needing a computer
as for PicoMite specifically, i have no idea what the latest version is anymore, since the codebase seems so splintered. i’m not personally following it myself
Thank you so much for that, that’s exactly what I hoped to find!
I’m having trouble building the UF2 Loader where it mentions a “pico sdk” but no version or where to get it, and I can’t find a pre-built version of the loader anywhere - would you happen to have such a thing, or know what I’m to do with this pico sdk?