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CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

cutiepi.io

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Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#51

Looking at the specs [1], I can't help but feel for $200 getting Wifi 4 (N, from 2008) and BT 4.0 (from 2010) leaves me underwhelmed. Maybe it was a cost decision, maybe licensing? Maybe due to power constraints? But damn, Wifi 4 is just objectively terrible and needs obliterating, it's borderline unusable and leaves me worried about the longevity of using such old standards in 2/3 years time (if that's the expecting…

Wifi 4 is more than fine.

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#52

Two-hundred bucks is basically "impulse purchase" territory, but I'm nevertheless struggling to see the use case here. If you're into maker projects with Raspberry Pis, then I'm not sure what this does for you. It's a Pi already built into a consumer device. Not seemingly a platform for new maker projects. If you want a tablet with a Linux kernel buried in there somewhere, then there's probably a thousand Android opt…

I’ve been thinking about my kid’s first computer and something in this ballpark is interesting. More hackable than iPad, not quite the complexity of a laptop. Not sure this one is quite right’ especially compared to the Pi400, but nice to have the tablet form factor.

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#53

I love this concept, I just really want one with an e-ink screen instead. I think there's a great niche for "embedded" devices around the home -- weather readout panels, lighting controls, music player, intercom, etc. -- but glowing rectangles mounted to the wall are just too... glowing. E-ink panels is where it's at, and a Raspberry Pi powering it is perfect. Unfortunately, the only real general-purpose e-ink tablet…

I'm sure it has been stated before but I do wonder why e-ink displays remain still so out of reach even though the sort of parents that were encumbering them have expired? It really does seem that anything that involves e-ink panels comes with a huge markup.

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#54

I love this concept, I just really want one with an e-ink screen instead. I think there's a great niche for "embedded" devices around the home -- weather readout panels, lighting controls, music player, intercom, etc. -- but glowing rectangles mounted to the wall are just too... glowing. E-ink panels is where it's at, and a Raspberry Pi powering it is perfect. Unfortunately, the only real general-purpose e-ink tablet…

When do the Pixel Qi / One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) / XO-PC screen patents expire? :) Why not both? :)

Update: oh holy shit, John Gilmore was a Pixel Qi investor, bought the patents to help the company close cleanly rather than go bankrupt, and licenses the patents with an generally-available Defensive Patent License[1]! What a story!!! Thanks John! Pixel Qi is from ~2010, so he's better than halved the time it took to get this amazing technology legally accessible to the world. The gotcha is that it's a somewhat "copy-left" gnu like license, so anyone unwilling to open some of their own patents for use (or not holding patents) is going to have to go to John to get these built, until these patents expire.

Just a quick word on the Pixel Qi screen, it's a LCD screen with a normal transflective mode, but it can also switch into a reflective black and white mode that works great outdoors. 10" 1024x600 screens go for a bit over $100 today.

[1] https://goodereader.com/blog/electronic-readers/the-rise-and...

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#56

I love this concept, I just really want one with an e-ink screen instead. I think there's a great niche for "embedded" devices around the home -- weather readout panels, lighting controls, music player, intercom, etc. -- but glowing rectangles mounted to the wall are just too... glowing. E-ink panels is where it's at, and a Raspberry Pi powering it is perfect. Unfortunately, the only real general-purpose e-ink tablet…

You can buy a 7.5” e-ink hat for the RPI for around 60$.

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#57

I love this concept, I just really want one with an e-ink screen instead. I think there's a great niche for "embedded" devices around the home -- weather readout panels, lighting controls, music player, intercom, etc. -- but glowing rectangles mounted to the wall are just too... glowing. E-ink panels is where it's at, and a Raspberry Pi powering it is perfect. Unfortunately, the only real general-purpose e-ink tablet…

There is the m5paper[1] that is around $80 with shipping. It uses an esp32 and is arduino compatible, and the provided libraries are pretty good.

[1] https://docs.m5stack.com/#/en/core/m5paper

Re: CutiePi – A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet

#58

The faq about battery concerns me a bit. "Achieved about 5 hours of standby time." Reporting standby time seems like a question dodge.

Saw that too. Standby time usually means when it is not in use but can be woken up instantly. That's a far cry from actual usage time. :-| (Compare that too typical tablets where the standby time might be several days or longer, and usage time also much more than 5 hours. Or phones.)
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