Electronics Weekly
The modules “are qualified against Bluetooth Core 6.0 that includes Channel Sounding, enabling tracking and locating use cases”, according to U-blox.
The multi-protocol 2.4GHz radio can also handle Thread, Zigbee, Matter, Nordic’s proprietary 2.4 GHz protocol and Amazon Sidewalk.
Processing comes from a 128MHz Arm Cortex-M33 processor and a RISC-V co-processor.
- NORA-B20 is the high-end part, based on nRF54L15 and has 1.5Mbyte of RRAM non-volatile memory and 256kbyte of ram.
- NORA-B21 is the mid-range part, based on nRF54L10 with 1Mbyte non-volatile memory and 192kbyte of ram.
- NORA-B22 is based on the nRF54L05, and is the low-end option with 0.5Mbyte non-volatile memory and 96kbyte of ram. It “still provides access to up to 31 GPIOs”, said U-blox.
- NORA-B26 is another nRF54L10 part, designed for use as an encapsulated radio for a separate host processor. Instead its internal MCU being user-programmable, it comes pre-flashed with U-blox’ u-connectXpress software, “allowing customers to easily integrate Bluetooth connectivity into their products with no prior knowledge of Bluetooth LE or wireless security”, claimed the company.
For the programmable modules (B20, B21 and B22), there is a software development kit called ‘nRF Connect’.
Output power is 10dBm (EIRP) from all of them, and peration is across -40 to +85°C and 1.71 to 3.6V.
Security features within the modules include secure boot, secure firmware over-the-air updates and tamper detection.
Variants measure 10.4 x 11.2 x 1.9mm if then need an external antenna (add a ‘1’ suffix, NORA-B201, for example), or they are larger at 10.4 x 14.3 x 1.9mm and integrate a PCB antenna (‘6’ suffix – see photo).
NORA-B20 is sampling, and there are also limited early samples of NORA-B21 and NORA-B22. B26 parts remain in the pipeline, but a pre-release version of the associated u-connectXpress software is available.
Find the NORA-B2 series on this web page
