OT: Neat little computing game changer- Raspberry PI

[Graziano]

I'm just posting this using a little computer a friend gave me last week called a Raspberry Pi, (I expect RayG already has a few by now :) ). This is a $35 credit card sized computer that runs the Linux operating system (with 13 more OS's in development). It's running a single core ARM processor at 700MHz and comes with a fixed 256Mb of RAM which makes it roughly as powerful as a $1000 desktop computer of about 10 years ago. To get the bare board running you have to buy a SD flash card, video cable, powered USB hub, keyboard and mouse so all up you're looking at $120 to get it operational as a network connected desktop computer.

This would be the sort of computer you'd use for a dedicated application like a homebrew CNC or machine vision. With it's HDMI video and dedicated camera connector or USB webcam you could also use it for close ups of what you're machining on the lathe with the right lens (while also playing MP3's). This looks like being a good cheap platform for specific tasks, about the only con's is the CPU and RAM are not readily available in small qty's and use a hard to solder package with RAM package soldered straight on top of the CPU package.



http://www.raspberrypi.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/7513051848_9a6ef2feb8_o-1024x682.jpg

[PDW]

Good timing. I was looking at the specifications of these yesterday. I eventually want a low power device to install on my boat, capable of running a navigation package and maybe a few other things. This one looks very interesting.

There's one person on another forum who has a home-brewed autopilot system running on one of these.

PDW

[BobL]

That thing looks very similar to the MB on my new 3D printer.
I don't know the full specs of the 3D MB but I know it has an ARM processor.

[Graziano]

PDW: I see someone hooked one up to a GPS and a webcam as well as a data transmitter to come up with a high alitude balloon project called the "Pi in the Sky". This means there's some GPS code already out there for it.
http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/1620

BobL: It appears to be a dedicated CPU for possibly DVD players as it has an onboard graphics processor as well as HDMI instead of the usual DVI computer monitor output. It should be possible to offload a lot of the computing grunt work to the GPU with clever programming. The ARM people let anyone license their designs for around 1/2 cent per CPU so they show up in just about everything including iPhones.

[RayG]

Hi Graziano,

Good thread topic! :2tsup:

With the Raspberry Pi, the low cost is the big thing, and that's attracting a lot of development work, there are dozens of hardware add-on projects appearing, I was looking at a servo controller (http://code.google.com/p/raspy-juice/) add on board earlier today.. lots of stuff over at hackaday.com (http://hackaday.com/category/raspberry-pi-2/)

Sadly, I've had one for about two months, and have yet to do anything serious with it.. just been too busy to play around. But that's about to change... :)

I predict there will be a bright future for low cost home workshop projects using it.

Regards
Ray