Time for Pi

[Stewart C. Russell]

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On 13-05-18 12:40 AM, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
> 
> OK, you've convinced me. I wanna get a Raspberry Pi.

Uhoh … I did see you get a bit amazed at what those boards can do at TLUG.

If you're going to be using it as a video player, this is a good
overview: http://wiki.xbmc.org/?title=Raspberry_Pi/FAQ

> Now ... about procurement...

Creatron is good, and Lawrence actually passes through the full price
from Newark, so he isn't actually more expensive than buying unit one
online. College and Spadina might not be super-convenient for you, so
Sayal has them for $59 at various locations around the GTA. Cost out
your time and travel, and it's probably a wash.

You will also need:

• USB power supply — the more powerful, the better. Anything rated at
under 1 amp may be iffy. More power is better. Anything rated for iPad
use will be okay. I use the Globe two-outlet+USB power taps that you
can get in Loblaw's for $12 (they're next to the lightbulbs).

• MicroUSB power cable — There's some awful crap out there, and not
all of it's cheap. Go for short and thick. There are data+charge and
charge only types; you really only need the latter. I use the short
Nokia cables from dx.com at $3 a pop.

• HDMI cable — cheap ones (~$5 from College St or Active Surplus) are
fine. Sayal might be $6-8. If you want to buy a Monster cable, can I
also interest you in this lovely beach-front timeshare just outside
Phoenix, AZ …?

• SDHC card — Unless you have a specific tiny embedded application,
get a brand-name Class 10 32 GB SDHC. Whatever Canada Computers had as
their weekly special is what I use. Technically, you should check the
compatible cards list (http://elinux.org/RPi_SD_cards) first.

• codecs — yes, it's worth springing a few bucks for these
(http://www.raspberrypi.com/) if you want to play MPEG-2 or VC-1. I
think the recent firmware has some pretty spiffy codecs built in for free.

• ethernet cable — unless you're going wireless

• powered USB hub — optional, but the Raspberry Pi has very little
protection on its USB ports, and hot-plugging something has a good
chance of resetting or hanging the board. Also, since the Raspberry Pi
only has two USB ports and the keyboard will use at least one, you're
going to need more at some point.

• keyboard/mouse/wireless/bluetooth — check
http://elinux.org/RPi_VerifiedPeripherals first. Some don't work at
all, some draw too much power. All the stuff you think you know works
'cos of the x86 hegemony many not work on the ARM-based Raspberry Pi.

> Is the system fast enough to run KDE?

Maybe for extremely small values of “fast”… ☺

The folks at The MagPi (a magazine about the board that I've written
for, http://www.themagpi.com/) did used to run LibreOffice and Scribus
on Raspberry Pis. I don't think they enjoyed it, though.

> And finally ... what are people doing for cases?

I think the Allied (or whoever's aligned with RS [Radio Spares]) ship
it in a small plastic box that can be used as a case — it has cutouts
for ports, and most importantly, the SD card is fully enclosed.

I have both the PiBow and the Adafruit cases. The PiBow is very
pretty, but fiddly to build. The Adafruit one is basically a mechanism
until you get the last part in place, but is easy to disassemble if
you need to add an RTC/GPIO cable.

cheers,
 Stewart

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