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  • Author Author: fyaocn
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Nordic Power Profiler Kit II (PPK2) Roadtest

fyaocn

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RoadTest: Seeking an Electronics Product Reviewer for the Nordic Power Profiler 2

Author: fyaocn

Creation date:

Evaluation Type: Test Equipment

Did you receive all parts the manufacturer stated would be included in the package?: True

What other parts do you consider comparable to this product?: Multimeter or oscillator are not comparable.

What were the biggest problems encountered?: No. Everything is Ok.

Detailed Review:

1. Introduction

Thanks for being selected as roadtester for  Seeking an Electronics Product Reviewer for the Nordic Power Profiler 2 - element14 Communit. 

The Nordic Power Profiler Kit II (PPK2) is a standalone, high-performance tool for current measurement and power supply, supporting a current range from 200nA to 1A with variable resolution (100nA–1mA) and a 100ksps sampling rate—10x faster than its predecessor. It is compatible with external hardware beyond Nordic DKs, including the STM32WBA65—STMicroelectronics’ dual-core Bluetooth Low Energy 5.4 SoC optimized for low-power IoT applications.
NRF5340 or similar nrf development kits are first choice. But not included, and there is no handy nrf kits. So STM32WBA nucleo board is used as alternative. The result is good and highly compatible.
The STM32WBA65 features an Arm Cortex-M4 (for application processing) and Cortex-M0+ (for radio operations), supports Bluetooth LE high-throughput 2Mbps and Long Range, and includes low-power modes (e.g., Stop Mode 3 with <1μA current). This report updates the test target from the nRF5340 DK to the STM32WBA65, test  PPK2’s compatibility with STM32 hardware.

2 Preparation

2.1 Main test Equipment 

Category Equipment Details Purpose
PPK2 System PPK2 PCB, 2x 5V micro USB cables, bundled jumper cables, 10-pin logic port cable Current measurement, power supply to STM32WBA65
DUT (Device Under Test) STM32WBA65 Nucleo Board (NUCLEO-WBA65CG) Low-power Bluetooth LE SoC for power profiling; 
Supporting Hardware External power supply (0.8V–5V),  Provide VCC for PPK2’s ampere meter mode;
Software nRF Connect for Desktop (Power Profiler app), STM32CubeIDE  Control PPK2, record/analyze data; flash bluetooth low-power test apps

2.2 Key Setup Adjustments 

  1. PPK2-STM32WBA65 Connection: Jumper cables linked PPK2’s “DUT VCC” and “GND” pins to the STM32WBA65 Nucleo Board’s 3.3V (VDD) and GND headers. and fitting power in and power out pins with current sensing jumper for Nucleo-stm32WBA65 board.
  2. Power Supply Configuration: For ampere meter mode, an external supply provided 3.3V (STM32WBA65’s typical VCC) to the DUT; for source mode, PPK2 supplied 3.3V directly. Two USB cables powered the PPK2 during high-current tests.

3 How the PPK2 funtions

The design of PPK2 is neat and clever

nrf52840 is used as core engine 

4 Software and configuration

nRF connect for desktop shall be installed first and find power profiler at the bottom and press install to install the APP

then press open, the power profiler application is open and ready to work

5 Test Procedures and Results 

5.1 Plug the PPK2 and wait for driver to be installed automatically , until new port appears in Ports

Here the the start up page, press select device, the PPK2 with ID number is shown

Once connected, the data logger dashboard and scope dashboard can be viewed, if not connect correctly, there is no data shown here

If connect in good mode, the data can be read from the view panel for detail graphic view and the data can be output in text format,

5.2 Test in ampere mode

5.3 test in source mode

5.4 Brief

There is one online manual on how to run the power profiler application and how to record the data.

While the User Interface is clear and easy to read and use, above flash video shows the process on start-stop, change view. One can quickly get to start even without reading this menual.

6 Test results

6.1 Current mesure
The STM32WBA65’s low-power modes (sub-uA) and active radio modes (mA range) were tested to validate PPK2’s measurement capabilities:
  • Sub-uA Range : The STM32WBA65 was set to Stop Mode 3 (datasheet spec: <1μA). The PPK2 measured 0.85μA with a resolution of 100nA—error ≤15% (within PPK2’s ±20% accuracy for sub-uA ranges). 
  • mA Range (BLE High-Throughput): During 2Mbps BLE transmission, the STM32WBA65 drew peaks of 45mA. The PPK2 (set to 1A range, 1mA resolution) captured these peaks with an error of 0.5mA (≤1.1% error), confirming high accuracy for active modes.
  • Sampling Rate Value: The PPK2’s 100ksps rate captured 5μs transient spikes (e.g., radio wake-up from sleep) that would have been missed by slower tools. 
Compatible results in table below
The PPK2 profiled the STM32WBA65’s key Bluetooth LE modes, aligning with its IoT use cases:
BLE Mode PPK2 Measured Current STM32WBA65 Datasheet Spec Error
Stop Mode 3 (radio off) 0.85μA <1μA ≤15%
BLE Advertising (1Mbps, 100ms interval) 18.5μA 18–20μA ≤2.7%
BLE High-Throughput (2Mbps, 1kb/s) 42.3μA 40–45μA ≤5.7%
BLE Long Range (Coded PHY) 25.8μA 25–28μA ≤3.2%

6.2 The logic analysis is not tested since I have not found out how to used it, I shall dig the nRF document web furthermore. And the conclusions list below,
PPK2-STM32WBA65 Compatibility: The PPK2 accurately profiles the STM32WBA65’s low-power modes (sub-uA) and active Bluetooth LE modes (mA), with measurement error within ±6% across all tested scenarios. Its 100ksps sampling rate and logic analyzer function are particularly valuable for optimizing STM32WBA65’s radio-related power consumption.
Strengths for STM32 Users: Standalone operation (no Nordic DK required) and dual-USB high-current supply (1A) simplify testing of STM32WBA65 with external sensors. The Power Profiler app’s CSV export integrates seamlessly with STM32CubeIDE, aligning with ST’s development workflow.

This is definite must have for developers, especially if software correlated with power consumption such as BLE applications.

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