The Raspberry Pi Foundation has officially launched the Raspberry Pi Pico 2, an upgraded version of the original Pico released in early 2021, now priced at $5.

The new Pico 2 is built on the RP2350 microcontroller, which features enhanced security capabilities, including Arm TrustZone technology, secure boot, and hardware encryption.

The RP2350 boasts impressive specifications, with 520 KBytes of SRAM, 12 programmable I/O state machines, and 24 PWM units, significantly surpassing the capabilities of its predecessor, the RP2040.

Equipped with two Cortex-M33 Arm cores, the Pico 2 is expected to deliver better performance, particularly in floating-point and digital signal processing applications.

In a notable advancement, the RP2350 also includes two optional RISC-V Hazard3 CPU cores, which can be selected at boot time, allowing for a mixed configuration with Arm cores.

The Pico 2 demonstrates significantly lower power consumption in sleep mode, consuming less than 10uA compared to 100uA for the original model.

Currently, there are no additional Pico-2 versions with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth chips announced, although a Pico W version exists featuring the Infineon CYW43439 chip.

A comprehensive review of the Pico 2's performance and features is anticipated once full software support is established.

Initial software support for the Pico 2, including MicroPython and CircuitPython, is still under development, focusing on the new RISC-V CPU.

Developers are encouraged to transition from STM32H7 to the RP2350 for enhanced performance, reliability, and additional features.

Eben Upton, a co-founder of Raspberry Pi, has indicated that initial stock for the Pico 2 will be limited, with more units expected to become available soon.