Arduino UNO Q Controller Bundle: Knobs and Buttons for Linux

Picture a classroom Linux desktop where the mouse has gone missing again and the only thing on the table is a knob. Turn it, and the cursor-driven app on screen responds. That is the scene Arduino is selling with its new UNO Q SBC Controller Bundle, covered by Hackster.

What did Arduino put in the box?

The bundle pairs the Arduino UNO Q 4GB with four solder-free Modulino modules: Buttons, Joystick, and Knob for input, plus Pixels for LED output. It sells on the Arduino Store at $107.76 against a planned $119.73. No USB-C power supply comes with it, and the USB-C Hub that adds HDMI, Ethernet, and extra USB ports is not included either, so budget for those before you plan a mouse-free desk.

How does the dual-brain design work?

The UNO Q keeps the classic UNO footprint and pin headers, but it runs Linux on a Qualcomm Dragonwing QRB2210 and hands real-time work to an STM32U585 microcontroller. Modulino knobs and buttons talk to the microcontroller side over the Qwiic connector (I2C, so SDA and SCL on two wires). The Linux side reads those events through Arduino App Lab, which is the part students tend to find tricky: two chips, two programs, one message path between them.

What is the takeaway for your bench?

Treat the bundle as a lesson in splitting jobs. Let the STM32 handle fast pin reads and debouncing, and let Linux handle the interface. An optional 3D-printed case is published on Printables under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license. To practice the same idea on cheaper hardware, wire a rotary encoder to two GPIO pins on any ESP32 and send its count over serial to a Python script on a Raspberry Pi. Start with the Arduino UNO Q documentation at docs.arduino.cc/hardware/uno-q and check current UNO Q listings at circuit.rocks.

Originally published on blog.circuit.rocks.

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