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Electronics => Open Source Hardware => Topic started by: Mprentice1 on October 25, 2012, 12:44:02 pm

Title: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Mprentice1 on October 25, 2012, 12:44:02 pm
I Went along to a Raspberry Pi Jam in london the other day. Really was a great evening, and loads of great projects going on.
Hope you'll have a read of my blog post and my friends more informative post.
What does everyone else think about the R Pi? what have you done with it?

http://theelectronicbyte.wordpress.com/2012/10/25/my-first-rapsberry-jam/ (http://theelectronicbyte.wordpress.com/2012/10/25/my-first-rapsberry-jam/)
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: fazz33 on November 04, 2012, 07:09:44 pm
Hey,

I'm enjoying my RPi that being said I'm more or less using it as a XBMC at the moment. It's got a lot of horse power for such a little platform. I do plan to learn more about controlling it's GPIO to more some more fun things but I got caught up in building things with arduinos instead.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: eyebrow on January 27, 2013, 05:48:29 am
I did see a guy restore a very very old tv with a new LCD and Rpi to drive it. Looked very tidy and was able to put old war movies on it. Good prop for antique store.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: c4757p on February 04, 2013, 01:35:47 am
I did see a guy restore a very very old tv with a new LCD

You mean, he put an LCD in an *old* TV (that previously had a CRT)? Poor TV... :( That's like emptying a beautiful old Tek scope with vacuum tubes and putting the guts of a Rigol inside.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: arekm on February 04, 2013, 08:13:10 pm
Tried to use rpi (256MB version, without overclocking) with XBMC. Rather bad experience. Worked but far from being smooth or fast, especially with 1080p movies.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: AlphZeta on February 18, 2013, 04:02:04 pm
Quote
Tried to use rpi (256MB version, without overclocking) with XBMC. Rather bad experience. Worked but far from being smooth or fast, especially with 1080p movies.

That's probably why they had decided to ship all with 512MB in Rev 2. I have the latest revision, but I think it's more or less of an expectation thing. Since I knew that it wasn't a powerful computer, I was actually quite amazed at what it can do for it's small size.

Yes, it is slow by modern standard (a simple apt-get dist-upgrade will take forever), but it runs the latest Linux, has support for tons of readily available apps and you can integrate with other hardware rather effortlessly. So it is actually quite an amazing achievement in my opion.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: NiHaoMike on February 22, 2013, 02:18:49 am
I did see a guy restore a very very old tv with a new LCD

You mean, he put an LCD in an *old* TV (that previously had a CRT)? Poor TV... :( That's like emptying a beautiful old Tek scope with vacuum tubes and putting the guts of a Rigol inside.
It was not mentioned if the TV was still working. Granted, putting a Pi and a LCD inside is not a particularly good use of space, the real deal is to put a LCD and a full gaming PC into an old TV.
http://technabob.com/blog/2007/11/12/soviet-tv-pc-casemod-from-russia-with-wood/ (http://technabob.com/blog/2007/11/12/soviet-tv-pc-casemod-from-russia-with-wood/)
Also note that it's possible to put a Pi into a working CRT TV with little or no permanent modification to the TV, but who actually wants to watch a flickery low resolution video nowadays?
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: jh15 on February 22, 2013, 05:46:08 am
Hmnn, I was going to strip my Hickok (Tektronics clone) Oscope for its 535a parts, but maybe I'll turn it into an aquarium for my Beta fish. (Until I get a final version fish).
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Denhart on March 11, 2013, 08:41:18 pm
I did see a guy restore a very very old tv with a new LCD

You mean, he put an LCD in an *old* TV (that previously had a CRT)? Poor TV... :( That's like emptying a beautiful old Tek scope with vacuum tubes and putting the guts of a Rigol inside.
It was not mentioned if the TV was still working. Granted, putting a Pi and a LCD inside is not a particularly good use of space, the real deal is to put a LCD and a full gaming PC into an old TV.
http://technabob.com/blog/2007/11/12/soviet-tv-pc-casemod-from-russia-with-wood/ (http://technabob.com/blog/2007/11/12/soviet-tv-pc-casemod-from-russia-with-wood/)
Also note that it's possible to put a Pi into a working CRT TV with little or no permanent modification to the TV, but who actually wants to watch a flickery low resolution video nowadays?

Looks amazing though, the TV mod that is... screw CRT TV's :P
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Kaluriel on March 13, 2013, 04:57:14 pm
My Raspberry Pi is now a lovely ornament under my TV. I've turned it on once, played a basic python game example they had they got bored. If I had a spare HDMI port, I'd probably use it more.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: melonstorm on March 13, 2013, 09:26:36 pm
My Raspberry Pi is now a lovely ornament under my TV. I've turned it on once, played a basic python game example they had they got bored. If I had a spare HDMI port, I'd probably use it more.

I'm not sure, but if you still got an older spare LCD screen or something lying around, you could try hooking up a HDMI to DVI adapter to the RPi. HDMI is supposed to be backwards compatible to DVI.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: hammy on March 13, 2013, 10:01:52 pm
... you could try hooking up a HDMI to DVI adapter to the RPi. HDMI is supposed to be backwards compatible to DVI.

Yes, that works. I use such a HDMI-to-DVI Adapter with my RasPi.  :-+
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: jh15 on March 14, 2013, 04:48:01 am
I also just tested a cheap HDMI to VGA adapter cable on my PI, it worked ok.

The PI inside an antique tv is a good idea, it has pond scum yellow video output jack, so it could be wired in after the IF stage or even through an RF modulator available at every yard sale.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: mbqwerty on March 22, 2013, 12:41:25 am
My Raspberry Pi is now a lovely ornament under my TV. I've turned it on once, played a basic python game example they had they got bored. If I had a spare HDMI port, I'd probably use it more.

I'm not sure, but if you still got an older spare LCD screen or something lying around, you could try hooking up a HDMI to DVI adapter to the RPi. HDMI is supposed to be backwards compatible to DVI.
I have seen some cases to mount the Raspberry Pi to the VESA mounting brackets of most monitors.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: aparlett on March 28, 2013, 12:58:09 pm
I just got my Raspberry Pi and i'm quite impressed the sky is the limit if what you can with it seem some pretty interesting projects.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Joules on April 17, 2013, 06:04:42 pm
I have a Raspberry Pi here, but since we don't own a TV or any monitors with HDMI the Pi got plugged straight into the router and configured with terminal software and then access via VNC.   Lovely, every device on the network can now access it, be that a smart phone, iOS or humble PC.   As you say loads of fun and potential, we even have multiple VNC sessions on the Pi but it doesn't half crawl with 3 people trying to using it.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: marcel.j on May 27, 2013, 10:25:43 pm
I am using it to run Open VC on my Robot ;D
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: amyk on May 29, 2013, 12:24:37 pm
I have a feeling the Raspberry Pi is not OSHW... :-//
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Mprentice1 on June 02, 2013, 12:56:36 pm
Another little project using the raspberry pi,
This time controlling a LED via twitter. Keep an eye out for where this idea is headed, a twitter controlled automatic drinks dispenser.
http://theelectronicbyte.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/twitter-led/ (http://theelectronicbyte.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/twitter-led/)
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Alana on June 02, 2013, 11:52:00 pm
Can i use TX and RX pins from GPIO header as terminal connection for Pi by default?
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: and101 on June 03, 2013, 09:22:01 am
Can i use TX and RX pins from GPIO header as terminal connection for Pi by default?
You can, you just need to convert the ttl level signals to RS232 level with a MAX3232 chip.  There are a few add-on boards available like the Serial Pi (http://www.abelectronics.co.uk/products/3/Raspberry-Pi/29/Serial-Pi-RS232-Interface) that plug into the raspberry pi and give you a DB9 serial connector so you can plug that into your pc with a null-modem cable.

You will need to make sure that the linux distro you are using is configured for terminal access, the Raspian image should work out of the box but some of the other images may need updating for them to work.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: cthree on July 06, 2013, 05:47:27 am
I have a feeling the Raspberry Pi is not OSHW... :-//

It is unfortunate that it uses a Broadcom ARM processor. Not only not open source, covered under NDA as well. I have one, used it once or twice, it was fine but I simply don't have the time to do more. Too many gadgets, not enough time to use them all.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: metalskin on July 31, 2013, 03:07:45 am
I've got a couple of Pis.

I've used the Pi as a headless server running node.js. The server connects to UAVs using the mavlink protocol and then allows clients to connect via websocket (HTML5 implemented protocol over TCP).

I setup a battery pack with a usb splitter cable so I can power the pi and a usb device. This lets me use a wifi dongle and a 433Mhz radio (3DR). I add a portable wireless router (also a 3g modem) and I have multiple clients connecting to the pi via tcp, with the pi connecting to UAVs.

I've also had two USB WiFi dongles connected to the pi and the UAV. This was to connect to the Parrot Drone (manually controlled UAV) with the client controlling the drone.

Just too much fun :-)
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: zitman on September 24, 2013, 01:25:05 pm
I have a few of them too.

One has been running as an XBMC box at home for just over a year now, it's one of the 256M units running OpenElec XBMC connected to my home network via mains networking, controlled via a Microsoft Media Centre remote control and receiver and it has played everything I have thrown at it so far.  It is used pretty much every day.

I have played around with one at home connecting to RTC's Accellerometers, LCD Displays, Barometric sensors, Current sesnors etc using GPIO & I2C.

I have set a handful up for work in kiosk mode to run our web dashboard system and, again, had no problems to date.

Nice piece of kit when used within it's capabilities.  Also served to remind me of the days when I was a Unix programmer!

Z
Title: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Rory on September 26, 2013, 02:23:30 am

I have a few of them too.

One has been running as an XBMC box at home for just over a year now, it's one of the 256M units running OpenElec XBMC connected to my home network via mains networking, controlled via a Microsoft Media Centre remote control and receiver and it has played everything I have thrown at it so far.  It is used pretty much every day.

Z

I have a couple of them as well. One is a dedicated XBMC box but I'm not entirely happy with it, as it crashes/reboots on many h.264 encoded mp4 videos - and always crashes at the same point on the video each time.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: magiccow on October 07, 2013, 02:05:46 pm
I've used the Pi in a couple of projects, running C and PHP applications connecting sensors etc to cloud services (e.g. thingspeak). I've also got some cheap SPI wireless modules, and I'm going to write some code to get an Arduino to send messages to the Pi. 

I have a project to wire up the shed to tell me (via email, SMS etc) when power has gone off to the freezer. Although the more I think about it the more I feel the the Pi is over powered for a task like that.  Current thinking is to use an Arduino or even just an Atmel/PIC chip.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: flattermann1822 on October 07, 2013, 04:32:41 pm
First of all, HELLO everybody! I'm new here.

On my pi runs a .net application with mono. I'm writing a program that do some homeautomation stuff at the moment. It's already possible to set GPIO's with my android smartphone. I've connected heating, lights, jealousy,... over relays to them. It makes a lot of fun.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: Prime73 on October 07, 2013, 08:57:53 pm
How did you resolve a well know problem with hardfloat and mono on RPi? I've been trying to resolve this for a while and ended up switching to softfloat to get my mono stuff working
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: briandorey on October 08, 2013, 05:01:25 pm
I have had one of mine running 24/7 as a data logger for my solar PV  and solar hot water system and it uploads the sensor data to http://home.briandorey.com/ (http://home.briandorey.com/) every minute
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: flattermann1822 on October 08, 2013, 05:14:41 pm
How did you resolve a well know problem with hardfloat and mono on RPi? I've been trying to resolve this for a while and ended up switching to softfloat to get my mono stuff working

I took the softfloat version, too. But that's ok for my application.
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: 99wilksjam on October 09, 2013, 01:22:31 am
Hi there, i'm using it to explore the possibilities in motion capture. Although there are some new products out there now that can make this easier. and are faster. I've seen a new korean computer which is the same size and has 1.7ghz quad core arm
Title: Re: Raspberry Pi
Post by: HeyTom on October 26, 2013, 01:40:41 pm
For less then 5 bucks, I turned mine into a way more powerful arduino.

I use the raspberry pi to send I2C commands to a microcontroller.  The microcontroller lets you set pins to analog or digital, input or ouput, pwm and some other stuff, like pulse counting.

I think it's cool because you can use any language you want to program, and then keep log files and access the whole thing through ssh.

here's link to a video of it in action, just using the built-in I2C commands on the pi to dim an LED and drive a servo.

Video10 Slow PWM (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0cPLM0hmA4#)