Components
- 1 x A-i Thinker Technology ESP-01 microcontroller based on ESP8266EX
- 4Mbit (512 Kb) external flash memory
- Espressif firmware
- 1 x Red LED
- 1 x 10K resistor
- Jumper wires
- Male to Female
- Female to Female
- 1 x Breadboard (830 or 400 holes)
- 1 x Breadboard Power Module MB102 (USB Input: 5V and Output: 3.3V)
- AMS1117 LDO circuit included
- 1 x ESP01/01S USB Programmer Adapter (CP2104 USB-UART Chip)
- Programming Mode (Enable)
- Reset button
Programming Utility, ESP8266 Library and USB-UART driver (MacOS Catalina)
- CP2104 USB-UART driver
- https://www.silabs.com/developers/usb-to-uart-bridge-vcp-drivers
- Arduino IDE software
- Board Manager (Generic 8266)
- ESP8266 Library
Circuit

Power Up the Circuit and Enable the ESP8266 chip
MB102 Breadboard Power Module provides 3.3V for the circuit. CH_PD pin connected to the 3.3v source to enable the ESP8266EX chip
Code (Output to GPIO 2)
On the Arduino IDE’s Tool Menu, setup the Builtin Led = 2 and the sketch will take the value 2 for LED_BUILTIN
/*
ESP8266 Blink by Simon Peter
Blink the blue LED on the ESP-01 module
This example code is in the public domain
The blue LED on the ESP-01 module is connected to GPIO1
(which is also the TXD pin; so we cannot use Serial.print() at the same time)
Note that this sketch uses LED_BUILTIN to find the pin with the internal LED
*/
void setup() {
pinMode(LED_BUILTIN, OUTPUT); // Initialize the LED_BUILTIN pin as an output
}
// the loop function runs over and over again forever
void loop() {
digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, LOW); // Turn the LED on (Note that LOW is the voltage level
// but actually the LED is on; this is because
// it is active low on the ESP-01)
delay(1000); // Wait for a second
digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, HIGH); // Turn the LED off by making the voltage HIGH
delay(2000); // Wait for two seconds (to demonstrate the active low LED)
}
Upload (binary code) to external flash memory (512 kb) via ESP01 USB Programmer Adapter
Resources
Arduino IDE software
https://www.arduino.cc/en/software
A-i Thinker
https://docs.ai-thinker.com/en/esp8266
ESP8266EX Datasheet
https://www.espressif.com/sites/default/files/documentation/0a-esp8266ex_datasheet_en.pdf
ESP8266 Library (Arduino IDE)
https://github.com/esp8266/Arduino
USB-UART CP2401 Drivers
https://www.silabs.com/developers/usb-to-uart-bridge-vcp-drivers
Espressif firmware
https://www.espressif.com/en/support/download/at