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Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

raspberrypi.org

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Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#511

Post by prokes »

metral wrote: post #469

Amazing news to see this! I made a Homemade Sports Ticker using a Model B almost 1.5 years ago and its still going strong. Here's a couple of links: * Blog post: https://medium.com/@mikemetral/a-homemade-sports-ticker-875c... * Code to write to LED Sign: https://github.com/metral/led_sign * Code to pull the scores: https://github.com/metral/scores * The LED sign itself: http://brightledsigns.com/programmable/indoor/b…

That's cool man, I'm sure you're friend was stoked. Props on the write up. I've got an old monitor I want to connect to the Pi, just not sure what info is worth displaying yet.

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#512

Post by rebootthesystem »

walterbell wrote: post #502
rebootthesystem wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The weak link is always curriculum. Without a "plan" and mentorship kids learn very little. Sure, they can follow step by step instructions, click things together but they are learning very little. Most kids learn nothing about strength of mechanical shapes by clicking together lego blocks. However, a curriculum that explicitly teaches how different structural shapes behave under various loads does teach them a lot.…

Do you recommend any sources on kid-friendly electronics curriculum development, either for homeschooling or as a hobby?

It's hard. I've done my own over the years. I'll look around and see. Products like SnapCircuits seemed to hold great promise yet they become horribly disappointing once you see a kid go from circuit to circuit without learning a thing. Such wasted potential.

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#513

Post by TeMPOraL »

rsync wrote: post #397
TeMPOraL wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because Broadcom won't sell them doesn't mean the factory won't make some more. This is China, they have a pretty liberal (and one could argue: more reasonable) approach to issues of intellectual property :). Or at least it used to be so; sadly, in the last few years the US was pressuring Chinese government to crack down on it. Anyway, you can read more about this phenomenon here: [0]. Oh, and one more thing. It…

"So Broadcom may not sell you their chip, but the lady on the first floor of SEG building in Shenzhen just might." And she will also happily affix a holographic "genuine" sticker to the part and package it in "original" "tamper proof" packaging. Just like brand new!

I've seen the stickers today. You can get quite a lot of them for less than a dollar :).

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#514

Post by robgibbons »

superuser2 wrote: post #437
Spooks wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why not build a htpc or an arcade box? very straight forward and you'll have more to talk about when your friends come over!

Can you actually build an HTPC? My understanding is they can't really handle video, except from the purpose-built camera module.

There are several HTPC implementations (eg. RaspBMC). They're all pretty nice, but personally, I just use omxplayer, which is the command line package that powers RaspBMC under the hood. It's a command-line-only media player, but it plays anything I can throw at it, including live-streaming 1080p YouTube videos.

The command-line interface for omxplayer is a bit verbose, so I wrote a basic wrapper in BASH, so all I need to do is type "play " and the video will begin streaming after a 10-second buffer. I keep a Screen session open on the Pi so I can drop in and command it from anywhere. At any given point, that little Pi can be simultaneously playing 1080p video, while downloading another two videos in the background. Incredibly capable little devices!

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#515

Post by AstroJetson »

SarahofGaia wrote: post #377

> Today, I’m pleased to be able to announce the immediate availability of Raspberry Pi Zero, made in Wales and priced at just $5. I'm confused: they say it's $5 but at Adafruit (one of the places where USAians can buy it), the cheapest are the Raspberry Pi Zero Starter Pack and the Raspberry Pi Zero Budget Pack, priced at $59.95 and $29.95, respectively.

I got on the notify list and was able to get a PiZero and the case for it on Saturday. I had other things on my shopping list, spreading the $9.12 shipping across other items.

They packed it today (Sunday) I got the ship notice and it will be here sometime on Tuesday.

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#516

Post by SarahofGaia »

j4d3 wrote: post #496
SarahofGaia wrote: post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's $5 at Adafruit, then how come it doesn't show it? Most of the time a store will list something even if it's out of stock, but will just put a sticker on the entry that says "Out of stock".

The $5 standalone was on their site yesterday morning with an "Out of stock" label. I suspect I wasn't the only person who was annoyed to see that listed next to the bundles, and they removed it because complaining. I still bought a bundle, because I haven't found any other way to get this in the next few weeks, and the board plus a few basics will be a great <$10 white elephant gift (after I see if I want to keep it…

I was only considering buying it myself because it was only $5. I've been needing a new computer. Lol.

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#517

Post by Natanael_L »

pjc50 wrote: post #286
Natanael_L wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here. What I'm fantasizing about is a kit with a set of compute modules in a "tower stack" with a power supply, with horizontally oriented boards stacked on the height, with all compute modules connected to ports in the tower. And you could choose where the pin-outs leads - either straight out to connect to some electronics on the outside, or straight down to a router in the bottom. Then you could dedicate some…

What's this stack for? I'd be very surprised if it beat PC hardware + GPU for MIPS or FLOPS per $ or watt.

Mainly experimentation.

Reference: https://www.parallella.org/

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#518

Post by SarahofGaia »

AstroJetson wrote: post #515
SarahofGaia wrote: post #377

> Today, I’m pleased to be able to announce the immediate availability of Raspberry Pi Zero, made in Wales and priced at just $5. I'm confused: they say it's $5 but at Adafruit (one of the places where USAians can buy it), the cheapest are the Raspberry Pi Zero Starter Pack and the Raspberry Pi Zero Budget Pack, priced at $59.95 and $29.95, respectively.

I got on the notify list and was able to get a PiZero and the case for it on Saturday. I had other things on my shopping list, spreading the $9.12 shipping across other items. They packed it today (Sunday) I got the ship notice and it will be here sometime on Tuesday.

Lucky!

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#519

Post by Yaggo »

duskwuff wrote: post #430
intrasight wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I had hoped for that as well. But connectors cost money. Could the camera module be attached via the header?

> Could the camera module be attached via the header? No. The Raspberry Pi GPIO header doesn't include all pins, and in particular it doesn't include pins that were used for other peripherals, such as the camera and display interfaces.

Interestingly you can get out DPI display signal from GPIO pins. Adafruit is using this technique with their Kippah display, giving you fully accelerated display signal (unlike those crappy low-fps-low-res framebuffer driven GPIO displays).

Re: Raspberry Pi Zero: the $5 computer

#520

Post by Yaggo »

duskwuff wrote: post #430
intrasight wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I had hoped for that as well. But connectors cost money. Could the camera module be attached via the header?

> Could the camera module be attached via the header? No. The Raspberry Pi GPIO header doesn't include all pins, and in particular it doesn't include pins that were used for other peripherals, such as the camera and display interfaces.

I asked this on RPi forums and got clarification from their engineer. It's not possible to connect CSI camera to Zero via GPIO. Required CPU pads are not connected.
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