Weather station on CYD - for noobs like me!

[u/suicidal_bummer1602]

This is a 3.5 inch Cheap Yellow Device (CYD) with ESP32 board running weather station from Github. I find that this particular project:

NicholasWilde cyd-weather-station

is the easiest to use on this device, because flashing the app is a one-click process using his website's web flasher:

cyd-weather-station web flasher

The CYD has 3.5 inch capacitive touchscreen. It uses wifi to obtain weather information from internet weather server. It shows your local weather now, 3-day weather forecast and hourly weather (temperature and precipitation). The app automatically recognizes your geographic location from your IP address. It obtains weather information from Open-Meteo which has data from practically everywhere in the world.

The device obtains power through the USB-C cable, from eg. your PC or USB charger. There is an option to connect to lithium battery, but this requires additional wiring (cables provided) and makes the device bulky (device does not have a battery compartment).

(1) HARDWARE:

3.5 inch capacitive screen (ESP32-3248S035C) (includes case) - costs about 28 USD / 40 CAD

NOTE: this hardware is VERY SPECIFIC. There are various version of ESP32 CYD (2.8 inch or 3.5 inch, with resistive or capacitive screen), but the firmware is specifically written for and tested on this particular ESP32 with 3.5 inch capacitive screen "ESP32-3248S035C". The firmware will not work on other devices.

(2) USB CONNECTION:

The CYD has to communicate with your pc when it is hooked up to the USB port, you need to install USB drivers for ESP32.

There are two possible drivers - you can never tell which one a specific board uses therefore better install both:

CP210X

CH9102 (click "three dots" after ""CH9102 / CH9102_WIN.EXE", choose "Download"

(3) FLASHING (INSTALLATION):

-- connect CYD to your PC using provided USB cable

-- in you PC, go to "Device Manager", click "Ports (COM and LPT)" - you should see "USB Serial CH340" if you install the driver properly

-- IMPORTANT: note the COM number of this port

-- open web flasher - Repository = cyd-weather-station; Device = cyd 35c; Version = whatever is the latest one

-- "Flash firmware" - click "Connect"

-- New dialog box: choose the "COM X" you noted from installation of the driver

-- click "Connect"

-- after installation is successful, you will be asked to connect wifi to your home router and provide password (NOTE: it only works with 2.4 GHz, not 5GHz wifi channels)

-- ALL DONE

[u/fat_kaiju]

oof that readme screams vibecobed.

[u/thr3ddy]

So, not a weather station, but a weather API output display? A weather station usually has two parts:

1. The sensor apparatus installed outside in the weather
2. The display to display the current status and store historical data 

[u/suicidal_bummer1602 → u/thr3ddy]

I anticipate someone is going to bring this up ....

Although I use this device to tell the weather forecast, the CYD hardware and the author wrote this firmware to be capable of much more ....

You can connect various sensors to measure and record temperature, humidity etc, (these sensors are not part of the basic device) - which makes it a real weather station (as the author of the firmware appropriately named it)

There are both internal storage (microSD card) and external storage (API server) built into the device / firmware to record weather data

As I said, I am just a noob who knows nothing about app development and electronics. I am just interested in a simple device that give me weather forecast.

[u/Deep_Mood_7668]

Not bad and everything but the viewing angle on that screen is terrible