Freenove Breakout Board for Raspberry Pi 5 / 4B / 3B+ / 3B / 3A+ / 2B / 1B+ / 1A+ / Zero 2 W/Zero W/Zero, Terminal Block Shield HAT with Pin Header, GPIO Status LED

There's lots and lots of breakout boards for single board computers out there. I've got piles of them, and most of them are junk. Board connectors that went flaky in weeks from bad solder. Spring terminals that stripped on the second use. Paper thin PCBs that cracked. Stickers I put on them because the silk screening was wrong or just not there at all. And then I found this one, and wow. Out of the box it is markedly higher quality than the average. It doesn't scream 'expensive,' it screams 'we know this has to stand up to the use case.' The FR4 is reasonably thick and avoids vias in high risk areas, a big plus for something that will invariably get yanked and bent and scraped. The standoffs very smartly, are quality plastic, not metal - no accidental shorts while connecting here. But you can use metal ones instead if you like - the PCB keepout is very generous. The spring terminals feel solid and strong, and if you should break some, they're easy to replace, being four blocks of 10. But where this one REALLY stands out, is the documentation. Most accessories and addons for these, you're lucky if you get some demo program that they wrote 8 years ago that didn't work back then either. Forget any sort of technical information. But Freenove, talk about above and beyond. They don't just give you clear, easy to read silk screening on the board to make things obvious. They give you four different, currently maintained demo programs with clear explanations of what they do and how they work. Already a great start! But then they take it even further. The very next page explains *why* they designed it that way, details exactly how it works, and gets ahead of the most likely problem. See, this uses buffers to avoid the problem of floating pins, something you won't find on other breakout boards. And they explain exactly how to set up your GPIO for accurate ADC sampling, and how to set it up if you need floating pins. Now that is someone who cares about not just throwing something together but delivering a quality *experience*. I've used this thing for all of four hours, and I cannot recommend it enough. If you do ANY prototyping with Raspberry Pis or compatible pinouts, just buy this now. It will save you countless hours and headaches every time you use it.

Better than I expected!! I bought one, loved it, then bought 3 more for developing hardware & software for Arduino Nanos and ESP32s. Great visibility into the GPIO pins. Its LEDs are buffered so they don’t load down the GPIO pins.

Thank goodness for these little breakout boards. It simplifies and makes working with sensors sooooo much easier. No more cutting wires and soldering then having to unsolder and whatnot. These things are awesome! I even like the little LEDs that show if there is a connection or not.

Good breakout for a Raspberry Pi. Love the status LEDs and tie downs for prototypes.

Worked great. I recommend using this breakout hat

I have had good experience with all of the Freenove hobbyist products that I have purchased through Amazon, and this one is no exception. The thing I liked most about this board is the presence of signal-state LEDs on all the signal lines. All of the LEDs are driven through buffers - no significant load is placed on the GPIOs. Connector pin silkscreen labels are clear and easy to read, with supply sources and grounds clearly marked in reverse print. Inclusion of non-conductive standoffs, mounting hardware and screwdrivers is a nice touch. It might have been nice to include a short ribbon cable to allow the board to be used in external non-hat configuration, as you would likely want to do if you have your Pi in a case, and/or have another hat board mounted, such as a NVMe SSD hat. This is not a deal-breaker for me, as there are plenty of alternate sources for suitable cables available.

I like the Idea but the screws should be Phillips head since the cheap flat head screwdriver is made to fit a baby's hand and the handle is rough not smooth which makes it very difficult to use. If they either change the provided screwdriver so it can be used by and ADULT male properly, I would definitely give it a much higher rating.

This is a nicely made board, the LEDs are colored & you can see at a glance what is going on with your GPIO pins. If only the GPIO software from Raspberry PI folks was as good (it is extra bad for the PI 5). But hey this is hardware, the lights work fine, they are even different colors by function. Silkscreen is clear & says what each pin is for, so you will be less likely to be "off by one" when counting pins.

Buono per test veloci con i led già a bordo

Fantastic way to expand your Raspberry Pi. Been working great. Will be buying more.

Wonderful, I don't have to mess around with LED's and resistors on breadboards to check my GPIO are ok, the built in LED's are all there for you. Nice you don't have to keep looking up the pinout diagram. A product well recommended.

Werkt oké; nuttig om het hoog-laag signaalniveau van een GPIO-pin te vogen via de ledjes op het bordje bij elke pin. Handig zou een bijgeleverde 40 aderige kabel zijn met connectoren zodat je het printje niet direct bovenop de Raspberry Pi moet klikken.

Great board. Easy to read labels, well positioned leds, good connectors.