$5 Raspberry Pi "Zero" !

[MT]

this doesnt bitbang gpio, it enables 100mhz PLL output on one pin and modulates its frequency = FM modulated radio transmitter

Had not checked up on that, so it is possibly to modulate the internal PLL, there must be more then one presumably, VGA etc.
On ST devices one cant modulate PLL, registers is locked. Maybe one could modulate the RCO but the range is probably to small.

should be doable with preempt kernel to avoid jitter or you could reuse DPI video interface (parallel video), DPI simply dumps contents of the framebuffer into gpio pins, only problem might be blanking (unless you can set blanking/backporch to 0 on the pee)

But reading the "real time" pages over Linux there is ton's of things that in the end seams to block Linux kernel from become a "true
(what ever that is) a real, real-time "thing". Seams to  be sort of a hack or another...something... well i don't know jack shit
abut Linux...but anyway... ........https://rt.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/HOWTO:_Build_an_RT-application

from hackaday:"With a PREEMPT_RT Linux kernel you can get (worst case) ~150 microsecond determinacy from user space C/C++ code on the RPi 1."
https://github.com/raspberrypi/firmware/issues/497 has a scope screenshot, looks pretty good

But that's terrible figures!

I  hope zeo is a long term project, and not a ploy to get rid of old chips , or last scream before Avago kills whole thing.

Hmm, if they had done this with the 2836 chip instead and let one core.... ...  even if all code and data would had
run from level1 cache this cpu is still not  deterministic....No? Yes?

In September 2014 English schools will need to meet the requirements of the new National Curriculum for computer programming. This aims to provide a high-quality computing education and to equip pupils to use computational thinking
and computer programming creativity to understand and maybe change the world!

Is'nt it kind of cheating badly to let kids of today start out by having an entire OS ready to learn coding?
Should'nt they have to go the hard way learning coding by writing the actual OS them self's?
Arn't the whole point of learning something is by doing it from scratch?
How are they going to change the world with probable determinism of 150us, +/-100us?

How far can a kid cheat and still get a grade? Why is teachers helping kids to cheat? Cant teachers write assembler?
Is'nt the requirement to write assembler a must for a teacher?What is the point of this National things UK politicians
slammed through their parliament?!...... Im confused!

[legacy]

This allows you to write hard real-time applications

soft real time, I guess

[Aodhan145]

A bare board like the Zero is only really suitable for more advanced students.

Schools tend to like  solutions like FUZE

http://www.fuze.co.uk/  which occupies the educational niche that the BBC Micro machines and their Archimedes successors filled in the '80s and '90s.

It isn't the initial setup cost, its the ongoing maintenance cost of a rats next of cabling  and adaptors x25 - x30 in a typical classroom, in teaching and support staff time alone.   The Zero *WILL* have a large impact on student projects - develop on a full PI, port it to a Zero, and get to keep it, but IMHO as long as it cant be tethered for easy cross-development from an existing PC, it will remain a niche product compared to Arduinos and BBC micro:bits.

I wouldnt mind making those, that much profit!

[tszaboo]

That FUZE looks so cool. But in this day and age BASIC should be banned.

Agreed. I learned BASIC when I was 8 or 9, and I forgot them as soon as I learned VB and C. Completely useless in modern society, with the exception of using them on a graphic calculator.

And 8.5 digit multimeters. And some other measurement equipment. And a bunch of calculators.  And a buch of other stuff where you never imagined that it can be programmed in basic as an "extra functionality".
It takes less time to learn basic than watching a movie, and there is high chance you will at least once use it in your life.

[Boomerang]

every programmer should be familiar with BASIC because he/she must be familiar with the evolution of the programming languages

[westfw]

If we really wanted kids to understand computers, the class would have a field trip to the local  eWaste/surplus dealer and each kid would pick out some "worthless" two-generations-old PC and associated components, and then the class would make them all work (running an appropriate version of linux, probably), and THEN they could install Python or Squeak or Basic and program it to do things.   Of course, this would require a level of knowledge and individual attention that is not expected of today's teachers (because it really isn't practical.)  So much easier to take the $200 kit that goes with the $5 hype, and comes with all the needed extra parts, curricula, training, and etc...

(The real problem with computer education is the rate of churn.  By the time you're comfortable teaching one thing, it's obsolete and you should be teaching something else.  (I mean, how many people here - engineering professionals and "serious" hobbyists - are all switched over to Windows-10?  How many are still running XP on at least some of their systems?  Wanna know why Arduino is so successful?  The flagship board has been essentially stable for nearly 10 years, and there's a large community of people who are "comfortable."))

[retrolefty]

If we really wanted kids to understand computers, the class would have a field trip to the local  eWaste/surplus dealer and each kid would pick out some "worthless" two-generations-old PC and associated components, and then the class would make them all work (running an appropriate version of linux, probably), and THEN they could install Python or Squeak or Basic and program it to do things.   Of course, this would require a level of knowledge and individual attention that is not expected of today's teachers (because it really isn't practical.)  So much easier to take the $200 kit that goes with the $5 hype, and comes with all the needed extra parts, curricula, training, and etc...

(The real problem with computer education is the rate of churn.  By the time you're comfortable teaching one thing, it's obsolete and you should be teaching something else.  (I mean, how many people here - engineering professionals and "serious" hobbyists - are all switched over to Windows-10?  How many are still running XP on at least some of their systems?  Wanna know why Arduino is so successful?  The flagship board has been essentially stable for nearly 10 years, and there's a large community of people who are "comfortable."))

 I think your on to something there. There is no real reason that artist and light hobbyist need to try and stay current with every new advancement in micro-controllers. Once they understand this Arduinoo "tool" and can make it do what they want, what need to they have to move on?

 That also allowed lots of years for the Arudino support infrastructure to grow including all those cheap Asian sensors and arduino accessories to say nothing of 10 years worth of contribution libraries whose quality ranges from yukky to pretty cool. It's been an interesting journey for Arduino and certainly there are a lot more and different kind on micro-controller users then before Arduino arrived. 

[GNU_Ninja]

Just came across this via the Sheffield Hardware Hackers & Makers e-newsletter.

http://c4labs.net/products/zebra-zero-plus-for-raspberry-pi-zero-wood

Quite a nice design, I think. Pity it only ships in the US 

[MT]

If we really wanted kids to understand computers, the class would have a field trip to the local  eWaste/surplus dealer and each kid would pick out some "worthless" two-generations-old PC and associated components, and then the class would make them all work (running an appropriate version of linux, probably), and THEN they could install Python or Squeak or Basic and program it to do things.   Of course, this would require a level of knowledge and individual attention that is not expected of today's teachers (because it really isn't practical.)  So much easier to take the $200 kit that goes with the $5 hype, and comes with all the needed extra parts, curricula, training, and etc...

(The real problem with computer education is the rate of churn.  By the time you're comfortable teaching one thing, it's obsolete and you should be teaching something else.  (I mean, how many people here - engineering professionals and "serious" hobbyists - are all switched over to Windows-10?  How many are still running XP on at least some of their systems?  Wanna know why Arduino is so successful?  The flagship board has been essentially stable for nearly 10 years, and there's a large community of people who are "comfortable."))

I just heard on the local radio about US eWaste had rasied to stunning levels because of Black Friday and at this "happening" people bought the very cheapest of cheap Chinese made scratch pads but because of these having little memory 512MB and low intensity screens people dumped these almost instantly. These are often based on BCM2835. As it so happends kids can buy a 60 usd touch screen to their 5usd PI zero.
http://www.engadget.com/2015/09/08/raspberry-pi-official-touchscreen-display/

65 usd happens to be more then the asking price of these Black Friday "things", so field trip's to eWaste could be a god lesson in many ways!

Do i have two XP's runing? Yes. Do i have win10? Absolutely no, to much of spyware thing.

[Rasz]

I just heard on the local radio about US eWaste had rasied to stunning levels because of Black Friday and at this "happening" people bought the very cheapest of cheap Chinese made scratch pads but because of these having little memory 512MB and low intensity screens people dumped these almost instantly.

propaganda, ear bait (radio clickbait ), designed to grab attention by creating outrage

https://medium.com/@parkermolloy/5-things-the-media-does-to-manufacture-outrage-ba79125e1262#.z786qmwpa
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/bitwise/2015/03/outrage_clickbait_its_internet_dominance_is_about_to_fade.html

These are often based on BCM2835.

for a special definition of "often" being NEVER

[MT]

propaganda, ear bait (radio clickbait ), designed to grab attention by creating outrage

It is not propaganda, the info came directly from the ministry of information, truly reviewed by interviewing workers at eWaste centers.
State radio here is advertising banned, its like north korea but friendlier, like west Germany!

Hmm, eWaste centers in Us actually sell back the junk you just left! That's illegal here, instead we ship old refrigerators to Uganda!
 http://sandiego.craigslist.org/search/sss?query=usdewaste
http://www.sandiegoewaste.org/electronics-re-sale-store/

for a special definition of "often" being NEVER

Schhh, dont wreck the ongoing 5$ hype!

[brobbuilder]

MT, I think you're just sore you can't have a Pi Zero because you're in Sweden. I bet you threw away an old laptop or motherboard in the last two years, which used and created waste of more raw materials than 20 Pis.

What is do bad about reselling old repaired ewaste? Would you prefer working refrigerators be buried in a dump so people poorer than you have no lowcost options? Everything on the site you listed is speakers, xboxes, telephones... What is the problem? Are you jealous that you can't buy an old game console for $45?

It is all easily recycled. No reason to both litter the earth and throw away revenue to fix other infrastructure.

Also, BCM2835/2836 are used only in Roku and video streaming gadgets, no Chinese-designed boards. Broadcom is very restrictive but also nicely cheap.

[alho]

It is all easily recycled.

Yes, very easily.

[brobbuilder]

It is all easily recycled.

Yes, very easily.

Not that kind of recycling, ya racist Dingus. I mean by grinding it up and melting for raw materials. Sure, it's dirty, but the Pis are RoHS so there's no lead.

[MT]

MT, I think you're just sore you can't have a Pi Zero because you're in Sweden. I bet you threw away
an old laptop or motherboard in the last two years, which used and created waste of more raw materials
than 20 Pis.

What is do bad about reselling old repaired ewaste? Would you prefer working refrigerators be buried in
a dump so people poorer than you have no lowcost options? Everything on the site you listed is speakers,
xboxes, telephones... What is the problem? Are you jealous that you can't buy an old game console for $45?
It is all easily recycled. No reason to both litter the earth and throw away revenue to fix other infrastructure.
Also, BCM2835/2836 are used only in Roku and video streaming gadgets, no Chinese-designed boards.
Broadcom is very restrictive but also nicely cheap.

What a load of preconcepted/preconceived mumbojumbo! You really got butt hurt for "what" i dont know.

[AlxDroidDev]

Since we've steered way off topic from the Pi Zero and are into electronics recycling, let me give my 2 cents: one man's trash is another mans treasure.

A few months ago I got (for free) a few printers (ink jet, laser and dot matrix), and 4 fax machine, on a total of 15 devices. They were all gonna be trashed, end up in a dumpster somewhere. The owner, however, let me have them.

I disassembled all of them, separating plastic, metal and whetever interested me: gears, displays, steppers, PCB, PSU, etc. The plastic and metal scraps were properly sent to specific recycling facilities. The PCBs were disassembled to remove whatever components I had interest in. I got a quite nice stash from these boards. The PSU boards were kept intact.

[zapta]

...I got a quite nice stash from these boards.

Tell us when you will actually use a significant portion of them. Until then it's just hoarding, like that Australian used parts collector in Dave's episode.

;-)

[Rasz]

It is all easily recycled.

Yes, very easily.

I got all my replacement laptop GPUs from this lady! All factory new, sealed in neat reels and everything.

[dannyf]

Raspberry Pi has announced a new, "reduced" RPi.  1GHz CPU and 512MB RAM, HDMI, USB.

Seem to be a direction a portion of the market is headed to: OS-based "mcu" development. A trade off between high hardware cost for low software cost.

[zapta]

Seem to be a direction a portion of the market is headed to: OS-based "mcu" development. A trade off between high hardware cost for low software cost.

The software is the top mask in the useful silicon manufacturing process. Cheap to customize.

[rrinker]

Ok 0xdeadbeef, you must be an old Netware guy like me 😀

As for amazement level, when I was born, computers took up full rooms, unless you had a PDP-8, in which case it took up part of a room. I was 11 when the TRS-80 Model 1 came out. $600 USD for a whopping 4K of RAM and 4K ROM. Ok, so it did include a keyboard. It ran at a blazing 1.78 MHz. This new Pi, while you do have to add a few thing to make it a 'real' computer, for $5 USD is simply incredible. Not quite 50 yet and already sawing wow, the stuff I've seen in my lifetime. Heck, I remember paying over a buck per plain red LED for some of my early projects.

         --Randy

[tszaboo]

So anyone knows if the Pi Zero can be bought from somewhere or this was just an expensive advertisement campaign for the raspberry pi? I mean EVERY single newspaper talked about the "5 dollar" computer.

[TheDirty]

You can monitor to see if anyone gets any stock here.  Stock empties quickly, though.
http://whereismypizero.com/

There's no real profit in these so the urgency to ramp up production and get in more stock isn't all that strong, I'm sure.

[CM800]

I'm curious, with all demand, in this modern day and age.. what is stopping them from churning enough out to satisfy demand? It seems like a common thing with Pi Foundation.

[Kilrah]

The fact they don't gain much, or most likely even lose on each sale. It was really just a promo tool IMO.