PINECIL – Smart Mini Portable Soldering Iron, New Version 2

Product Information

The grip on the Pinecil is good – the rubberized plastic shroud prevents slip – but the TS101’s textured grip and button placement just feels better. The Miniware TS101 is a great iron and we enjoyed using it and it will do 99% of the tasks that a maker requires. The TS101’s two power inputs give us between 45W (USB) and 65W (DC) of possible output. The higher output is only achievable with a 24V PSU. We would only need that power for large solder joints and multi-layer boards which can soak a lot of heat before soldering.

Miniware TS101 Smart Soldering Iron Review: Lots of Options

Sleep mode: power & tip saving, such as sleep mode, sleep temperature, and shutdown modes, motion sensitivityTo heat up the tip, we need a power supply that can provide at least 12V 3A to run. This is the bare minimum. Pinecil will heat slowly at only 12V/3A. To maximize performance, higher Volts/Amps/Watts is recommended (see Pinecil Power Supplies).

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Recommend operating voltage 12-21V, some components can tolerate higher voltages at "absolute maximum" but it's very ill-advised QC is more problematic for V2 which comes with the Pine64 designed shorter 6.2 ohm resistance tip. This means the V2 needs more power than the V1. Switching to the longer traditional ts100 style tip in V2 would reduce the power requirement a little, but then you lose a small amount of heat speed/performance. For most soldering tasks, it all depends on what you are soldering and what the nearest power source is. Heating up to a stable 350 degrees Celsius was identical in our tests, with both power sources hitting the magic temperature in 15 seconds. We tested this with a USB-C bench power supply (Pine’s Pine Power) that provided 20V at 2.6A (52W) and a DC PSU which provided 19V at 2.1A (39.9W). Recommend operating voltage 12-24V, but a 12V USB-C charger will not perform as well or heat as fast as a USB-C PD65W/20V/3amp charger.

PineSound 

Much of the work on Star64 work has now finished and the board in its final layout stage. There is still some testing needed, which will help us characterize the single board computer’s qualities and performance. The initial review has yielded some very positive results, partly because the SoC runs cool without the need for passive or active heat dissipation, even under load. The SoC running cool without a heatsink is great news, as it opens the door for the platform to become a basis for future devices. In any case, the initial impressions are very good and we have high hopes for the Star64 becoming an opener for our RISC-V single board computer range. It will still take some time before Star64 finds its way into the Pine Store, but the engineers are working hard to make the launch happen sooner rather than later. I will keep you posted on Star64’s progress in the coming months. Option 1: a USB-C supply that can negotiate up to such a voltage. For good performance and soldering experience, a USB-C PD65W, 20V, 3+ A charger is recommended (suitable for most users). However, some changes cannot always be integrated in the project, and for various reasons: they do not fit with the project vision or priorities, developers do not have the time to review them or… the changes consume too much memory!

TEST CLIPS UK - PINECIL – Smart Mini Portable Soldering Iron V2

Findecanor said:A common complaint of the TS irons is that the handle gets too hot after a while, so you can't use it for too long.DC barrel 24V is supported on V2 (most V1 can only do a max of 21V unless a modification is performed to cut the trace to the Vbus and enable 24V safely (see Ralim's IronOS DebugMenu for details) Live chat has volunteer members that are not paid PINE64 employees, but occasionally get official information.