May 14, 2026
Scan-fluencers go to war
DIY open-source ultrasound hardware on the rp2040/rp2350
Cheap DIY ultrasound just ditched the scary stuff, and the comments are already fighting
TLDR: The new pic0rick board makes DIY ultrasound cheaper and far less intimidating by replacing harder-to-use hardware with a familiar low-cost chip. Commenters are split between calling it a breakthrough for hobbyists and insisting it’s less revolutionary than advertised.
A tiny open-source board called pic0rick is being pitched as the new easiest way to build your own ultrasound setup, and the crowd is absolutely eating up the part where it throws out the intimidating old-school chip setup. Instead of relying on a more niche, harder-to-use control chip, it uses the same kind of super-cheap microcontroller hobbyists already love, while still handling the precise timing needed to send a pulse and capture the returning echo. Translation for normal humans: it promises serious ultrasound tinkering without requiring a PhD in pain.
That ease-of-use angle is where the community got loud. One camp was downright delighted, with people basically saying this little board makes expensive, complicated hardware feel weirdly accessible. The biggest cheer came from folks obsessed with the RP2040’s special timing feature, calling it a “good enough FPGA on absurdly cheap hardware” — which is nerd-speak for “this tiny cheap chip is pulling way above its weight.” Another commenter immediately started dreaming bigger, asking if paired with other sensor tech, this could become a full hardware solution.
But of course, because this is the internet, someone had to show up with the cold-water take: actually, they argued, you don’t even need that fancy timing trick and a regular microcontroller could do the job with the right setup. And just like that, the thread turned into a classic tech-comment-section showdown: breakthrough for the people vs. calm down, this isn’t magic. Peak hardware drama.
Key Points
- •pic0rick is presented as the recommended new board in the un0rick ultrasound hardware family, replacing FPGA-based designs with RP2040/RP2350 microcontrollers.
- •The board includes a 60 Msps 10-bit ADC, AD8331 variable-gain TGC amplifier, MCP4812 DAC control, and a three-level pulser implemented with MD1210 and TC6320 on a separate pulser board.
- •The hardware is organized as a three-board modular system: main board, pulser board, and a ±25 V high-voltage board for pulse generation.
- •The article says RP2040 PIO state machines provide deterministic timing for ultrasound acquisition, replacing the timing role previously handled by a Lattice iCE40 FPGA.
- •Expansion options on the double PMOD connector include VGA output, a multiplexer board for multiple transducers, PSRAM for longer buffers, and custom add-on boards.