Solar/UPS Pi Platter from Rocket Blue Automation is a versatile expansion board that provides the missing expansion ports for your Pi Zero and lets you run it anywhere. It is designed to be flexible enough for a lot of applications from solar-powered remote sensing to built-in UPS functionality for small file servers. The board is controlled by a local micro-controller (PIC16F1459) acting as a PMIC/RTC that also enumerates as an ACM serial device to the Pi via USB. It has a simple ASCII command set for configuration and control. Pi Platter can also be used with other Pi models.

What Can You Make With the Pi Platter?

The Pi Platter is a very versatile board. For starters, you can use it to make:
- Robots
- Remote server
- Solar power management
- Mini Tablets
- Wildlife Cameras
- Hydroponics and greenhouse controllers
- Various remote Internet of Things applications
- And much more

Pi Platter: A world of expansion without using a single GPIO pin

Features of the Solar Pi Platter include :

- Smart UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) allows you to power your project directly from an attached USB charger and automatically switch over to the battery if the power fails. The Pi Platter makes sure the battery is charged and warns the Pi of low battery so it can shutdown properly.
- Optimized Solar Charger so you can power your Pi from the Sun for remote applications. Special features allow you to shutdown the Pi when the power is low and the automatically restart the Pi again when the battery is charged.
- Supports a wide range of LiPo batteries to match your specific needs.
- Real Time Clock with repeating alarm keeps track of time when the Pi is off and schedule times to start the Pi (great for remote time lapse photography).
- Header that matches a Sparkfun break-out board for adding a direct Ethernet port.
- 3 High Speed USB ports with multiple queues allow different speed devices to operate simultaneously. Much faster than other Pi Zero USB boards that force all USB devices to operate as fast as the slowest device. Two of the USB ports are power-switched so you can optimize power consumption in your application.
- Low Power micro controller interfaces your application to the Pi Platter through a simple USB serial port so it does not tie up any GPIO pins. You still have all the GPIO pins available.
- 2 x 10 bit Analog Inputs let you interface to the real world.
- 2 x 8 PWM Outputs, that can also be configured to drive standard RC servo motors, let you control motors, LEDs and real world devices.
- Store board configuration even when power is off to let you power up without error.

To learn more about the Solar/UPS Pi Platter for Raspberry Pi do visit their KickStarter Page and make a pledge if you are interested. More technical details regarding this project can be found at: https://hackaday.io/project/9819-solar-pi-platter.