Raspberry Pi - Who's gonna have a dabble?

[Otispunkmeyer]

This is a tiny little SoC computer (system on a chip, much like what powers smart phones) developed and produced by a group of guys from cambridge with the view to making hobbyist computer programming and learning about computer programming much more accessible. (not just software programming, but actual machine programming). This in a bid to get peoples skills and experience up before coming to university as they mention that since computers got more complex and more locked down, applicants to computer courses are arriving sans any programming skills whatsoever.

Its basically a little board with a Broadcom ARM based SoC, some inputs and some outputs. You can connect keyboards, ethernet and HDMI devices and using a linux distro, have a functioning computer that will let you browse the web or watch HD video. You can then tinker and program to your hearts content!

The best bit is there are 2 models, costing $25 and $35. Thats it!

Linky: http://www.trustedreviews.com/opinions/raspberry-p...

and a link to someone with a Beta board who's programmed it to work with AirPlay. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2v6FOji3lq8

[onomatopoeia]

There's another topic on here somewhere which is several pages long, but I'm going to be joining the scramble to order from the first batch when it arrives.

[Otispunkmeyer]

onomatopoeia said:

There's another topic on here somewhere which is several pages long, but I'm going to be joining the scramble to order from the first batch when it arrives.

Supposedly these will be up for purchase (direct from them) in the next week or so (limited to 1 per person). I cant wait to see what people can do with these things.

[slinky]

http://www.pistonheads.com/xforums/topic.asp?h=0&a...

[TheHeretic]

Liking the airplay application. Could be very cool even with just that.

[TotalControl]

Very cool, have registered on the site quite some time ago.

Also read gsmarena where they state ubuntu is being put into smartphones so that they can be put onto a cradle and booted up connected to a mmonitor.

[Tonsko]

TotalControl said:

Very cool, have registered on the site quite some time ago.

Also read gsmarena where they state ubuntu is being put into smartphones so that they can be put onto a cradle and booted up connected to a mmonitor.

Do they want you to register to order?

[Marf]

TotalControl said:

Also read gsmarena where they state ubuntu is being put into smartphones so that they can be put onto a cradle and booted up connected to a mmonitor.

Similarly - http://tablet-news.com/2012/01/17/fujitsu-lifebook...

[annodomini2]

Tonsko said:

Do they want you to register to order?

No just they email you when it goes on sale.

As I give the webshop about 5mins before it crashes.

There are 10,000 in the first batch and they've already had 60,000 downloads of the standard operating system.

[aclivity]

I will be doing everything I can to get one as soon as they come out. At least one - I quite fancy having a network of them! The Raspberry Brambles cluster reference architecture is available, I believe, so a 5 or 10 node cluster is quite possible. I also believe there is a demo of one running XBMC live - which would be my choice to run it as a media centre hanging off the back of my TV (powered from the TV USB port).

I am tempted to get one for my parents though, as they have nothing but trouble with their windows PC - it just does too much for them, a Fedora powered Pi will be much easier to lock down as a web browser / libre office machine.

Sad thing is that the people who will rush out and buy them are probably middle aged geeks - like me - rather than the intended market of kids / early teens who may be interested in computers.

[annodomini2]

aclivity said:

I will be doing everything I can to get one as soon as they come out. At least one - I quite fancy having a network of them! The Raspberry Brambles cluster reference architecture is available, I believe, so a 5 or 10 node cluster is quite possible. I also believe there is a demo of one running XBMC live - which would be my choice to run it as a media centre hanging off the back of my TV (powered from the TV USB port).

I am tempted to get one for my parents though, as they have nothing but trouble with their windows PC - it just does too much for them, a Fedora powered Pi will be much easier to lock down as a web browser / libre office machine.

Sad thing is that the people who will rush out and buy them are probably middle aged geeks - like me - rather than the intended market of kids / early teens who may be interested in computers.

First batch is one per customer, how they intend to enforce that, I have no idea.

[eharding]

annodomini2 said:

aclivity said:

I will be doing everything I can to get one as soon as they come out. At least one - I quite fancy having a network of them! The Raspberry Brambles cluster reference architecture is available, I believe, so a 5 or 10 node cluster is quite possible. I also believe there is a demo of one running XBMC live - which would be my choice to run it as a media centre hanging off the back of my TV (powered from the TV USB port).

I am tempted to get one for my parents though, as they have nothing but trouble with their windows PC - it just does too much for them, a Fedora powered Pi will be much easier to lock down as a web browser / libre office machine.

Sad thing is that the people who will rush out and buy them are probably middle aged geeks - like me - rather than the intended market of kids / early teens who may be interested in computers.

First batch is one per customer, how they intend to enforce that, I have no idea.

One per delivery address, I think.

[TotalControl]

eharding said:

One per delivery address, I think.

Nice. I'll have one delivered to me and one to my folks and another to my uncles and another...

[Matt..]

I still don't know how it's all taking so long!

I want to use them for XBMC, though i'm not yet convinced it's going to be fast enough for running it all at a speed as to not annoy anyone using it

[simonrockman]

I thought it was a great idea,and then I thought again..http://www.zdnet.co.uk/blogs/fuss-free-phones-simon-rockman-10024919/is-raspberry-pi-a-mid-life-crisis-10025449/

[TheHeretic]

simonrockman said:

I thought it was a great idea,and then I thought again..

Linky

[simonrockman]

Thanks, sorry, I was just being lazy.

Simon

[onomatopoeia]

simonrockman said:

I thought it was a great idea,and then I thought again..http://www.zdnet.co.uk/blogs/fuss-free-phones-simon-rockman-10024919/is-raspberry-pi-a-mid-life-crisis-10025449/

One of my colleagues is very keen to buy one or more Pies and he's 26. He has said in the past that in a lot of respects he wishes he'd been born 20 years earlier to be around when all the exciting stuff was happening with home computing though.

I think it might have been me explaining about how I used to go into shops (the good old days when there were home micro shops on the high street and the likes of John Menzies would have a dozen different ones next to the record department) on a Saturday morning and write a couple of dozen lines of assembly language on their BBC Micros, assemble to about 0130h (which was the stack, that ran from 01ffh down to 0100, but the bottom got used for something else as well, and did not get cleared between resets), then redirect one of the OS routines called on a restart to said code. End result was when the computer was rebooted it declared itself to be an "ITV computer 28K + 4K adverts"

Well it appealed to my sense of humour anyway , if not that of the shop owners on occasion . And yes I am one of the generation of self taught programmers - the ZX81 was the first step but the BBC Micro with its fabulous built in assembler was a revalation. I remember disassembling the whole OS and printing it out on fanfold paper, then annotating it as I worked out what it did. I've still got it in the loft, and the "Elite" disc, but not a telly with an analogue tuner to plug it in to.

I want a Pi to be a media player next to the telly, I also want one to replace the old P3/667 box that runs my mail and SSH servers on an ancient version of debian. I don't want to program it, I do enough programming (some of it in assembly language) in my day job.

[annodomini2]

onomatopoeia said:

simonrockman said:

I thought it was a great idea,and then I thought again..http://www.zdnet.co.uk/blogs/fuss-free-phones-simon-rockman-10024919/is-raspberry-pi-a-mid-life-crisis-10025449/

...I want a Pi to be a media player next to the telly, I also want one to replace the old P3/667 box that runs my mail and SSH servers on an ancient version of debian. I don't want to program it, I do enough programming (some of it in assembly language) in my day job.

This could actually be the key to getting education going with it, if a lot of people buy them for media player or other use, they'll be around the house when the new 'computer studies' or whatever else it's going to be called gets off the ground. (Probably about 3 years if anything!)

[3dge]

Indeed and unlike the family PC, at £20-£30 it doesn't really matter if an inquisitive mind breaks it!

I'm definitely getting one, there's quite a few things I can see it would be useful for.