ARK Just A Pi Shrinks Raspberry Pi CM5 Connectivity to 55 × 40 mm

ARK Just A Pi CM5 Carrier Board

ARK Electronics encompasses exclusively revealed the ARK Just A Pi, a miniature carrier board for the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5. ARK Just A Pi is a petite NDAA compliant carrier board for the Raspberry Pi CM5 for drones, robots or additional space-sensitive embedded applications.

The board integrates a 100 Mbps Ethernet switch with two JST-GH Ethernet ports, a micro-HDMI port, two MIPI CSI camera connectors, a microSD card slot, a PCIe FFC connector, a USB 3.0 Type-C dual role connector, and a variety of small connectors for UART, SPI, PWM, GPIO and fan. It also has a power connector for the company’s PAB power modules. The board is a miniature form factor board for incorporation into autopilot and embedded systems.

Previously, we covered other Raspberry Pi CM5 carrier boards, including the CM5 MINIMA Carrier Board, which adds AI acceleration and display interfaces, and the CM5-NANO-B, featuring USB 3.2, HDMI, PCIe, and Gigabit Ethernet. Feel free to check them out if you’re interested in exploring more CM5 carrier board options.

ARK Just a Pi Block Diagram

ARK Just A Pi Specifications:

• Supported Compute Modules:
  • Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 (CM5): Full interface support
  • Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4 (CM4): Supported with certain interface limitations:
    • CSI1 / CAM1
    • UART2
    • USB-C
    • PCIe
    • Fan interface
• Storage:
  • MicroSD card slot
  • Supported with CM4/CM5 Lite variants that do not include onboard eMMC
• Display: 1× Micro HDMI output
• Camera Interfaces:
  • 2× 22-pin, 0.5 mm-pitch FPC connectors
  • Compatible with the Raspberry Pi 5 CSI camera pinout
• Ethernet / Networking:
  • 2× 4-pin JST-GH Ethernet connectors
  • Dual 10/100 Mbps Ethernet connectivity
  • Integrated Ethernet switch
• USB Connectivity:
  • 1× USB 3.0 Type-C dual-role port
  • 1× USB 2.0 interface via 4-pin JST-GH connector
• Serial and GPIO Interfaces:
  • 6-pin JST-GH connector for UART0 Debug / GPIO
  • 6-pin JST-GH connector for UART2 / SPI3 / GPIO
  • 6-pin JST-GH connector for UART3 / SPI4 / GPIO
  • 6-pin JST-GH connector for UART4 / PWM / GPIO
• PCIe Expansion:
  • 16-pin FFC connector
  • PCIe Gen 2/Gen 3 ×1
  • Connector layout compatible with the Raspberry Pi 5 PCIe interface
• Cooling / Fan:
  • 4-pin JST-SH fan connector
  • Same connector format used on the Raspberry Pi 5
• Power Supply: 
  • 5V / 2A or higher input
  • 6-pin Molex Clik-Mate power connector
  • Integrated I²C interface for ARK PAB power modules
• Dimensions: 55 × 40 × 13.1 mm
• Weight: 19.5 g

ARK Just A Pi CM5 Carrier Board Bottom View

For those who choose to buy a bundle with a CM5 and a microSD card, ARK OS is already installed on the system and users have access to the ARK UI dashboard for default settings. The instruction manual includes a getting-started guide, flashing instructions for CM5 Lite and CM5 eMMC modules, Wi-Fi setup, SSH access, pinout, a block diagram and a 3D model. The documentation website will have (partial) instructions for starting and more technical details. Refer to the GitHub page for OS Package and other details. 

ARK Just A Pi peripherals

ARK Electronics currently offers the ARK Just A Pi carrier board for $335, or someone can select a bundle with the board, a Raspberry Pi CM5 Lite 2GB Wireless, and a 64GB NDAA-compliant microSD card with ARK UI pre-installed for $475 on the same page and the Waveshare CM5-NANO-B carrier board may serve user needs better at $17 to $28. 

Images used courtesy of ARK Electronics.