Raspberry Pi

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Firefox
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Firefox »

There are loads of people building Retropie handhelds nowadays using Pi Zeroes, mostly using various Game Boy shells. I thought this one was exceptionally neat, though.




More seriously, I'm finding the Zero W's amazingly useful in my day job! I can hook them up to the embedded systems I'm developing and use them to log data, control inputs, and even display stuff in real time on various miniature monitors I've accumulated. I power them using the sort of power banks that people use for recharging their mobile phones, which seem to last forever (I suspect they'd power a Zero W for at least a couple of days straight if used continuously).

The really great thing is that I can log in to the Zero W's over wi-fi using SSH from my laptop. I can have multiple sessions going in different terminals, copy stuff back and forth using scp, compile code actually on the Zero W itself, etc etc. Top stuff!

The moment I really felt "I living in teh future!" was when I first SSH'd into one from a terminal app* running on my phone and kicked off a program to log some data during a test. It's often a pain in the arse to use my laptop for that when I'm outside, especially when it's raining. It's so effortless to whip out my phone and tap out a command or two to kick off a program, kill it, or take a look at how much data has been accumulated. If I wander out of range it'll all reconnect again when I come back, and I don't even have to start a new SSH session. It's flippin' magic! :D

Anyway, I thought people might find it interesting to hear how I'd actually used this stuff, rather than my usual "imagine the possibilites!" -type posts.

* I use an app called JuiceSSH, which has an extra pop-up keyboard above the stock Android pop-up keyboard that contains arrow keys, sticky control key, and useful punctuation that's handy for entering shell commands.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Baggypants »

What you need to do now is switch the phone for another pi.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Firefox »

They talk to each other just fine (and to my Thinkpad). Using the phone is massively more convenient when I'm outside, though, and it acts as an access point for them all to talk to on their own private wi-fi network, plus it acts as a fast gateway to the internet via 4G.

Actually, now I'm seriously thinking about getting a phablet so I can have a bigger on-screen keyboard (although I do pretty well on my current phone's 5" screen) and more space left to see the actual terminal.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by toxibunny »

I used to log into my pi's gpio serial port using Bluetooth on my phone and a (HC-05?) Bluetooth module 8)
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Firefox »

I gave that a quick try using the Zero W's bluetooth and my Thinkpad, but it didn't work wonderfully well - there was lots of garbage characters at the start and the occasional one sometimes afterwards, sometimes the link would drop, etc etc.

I fully expect it's because I haven't understood something and so haven't configured one or both ends correctly, though. When I have more time I need to go back to that, read up on it properly and try again.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Firefox »

*** sigh ***

I just bought one of the old Pi 3Bs last week. Along with a case that's not compatible with the new 3B+. And I missed the bit where I was supposed to type in the 15% discount code... :?

Oh well, I haven't actually lost anything, and it's nice to see them making solid improvements without upping the price.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by zip accident »

Seems there's now a Ras Pi 4B:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/06 ... rformance/

That looks good in parts.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Barney »

Waiting for a Pi4a, so it can be inserted into gameboy DMG cases for retropie goodness. BUT...

The Pi4 as it stands is very, very power hungry. So much so that current batteries being used in handhelds won't be able to power it and charge it at the same time. Not to mention the reduced battery life to start with.

Which is a real shame, because the libretro emulators are not the most optimal and the Pi4 will significantly boost the systems that can be emulated - personally, I'd love my Pi cab to be able to run Power Drift without stutter... And I probably will, as I can just drop a Pi4 in and add the relevant PSU. But not in a handheld, which is disappointing.

Still, I'm sure that someone will figure it out. It's just a matter of waiting.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by venusian »

If you're not using it to it's full capacity, it will use less power. So maybe limit the clock, turn a couple of the cores off?
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Barney »

Seems to be the only option, yeah. But given the single-core nature of the LR emulators, this means that the Pi4 will deliver roughly similar performance as the Pi3 when slightly overclocked. Which is a bummer. Suppose it remains to be seen what people do with it, if anybody bothers :)
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Re: Raspberry Pi

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I can see people on youtube starting to get emulators working. Even if the cores are single-cpu, won't the improved cpu and graphics and RAM end up making a big difference? Eben upton said it might be up to 3x the performance of a pi 3, 'depending on your workload'...

It seems to me to be a significant upgrade. I'm waiting for the emulator comparison videos to start appearing.

I think I've had an idea about what to do with my pi zero. I'm going to turn it into a handheld thing with arcade buttons, analogue knobs, and an 8x8 rgb led display. maybe even a gyro/accelerometer too. I don't like programming microcontrollers, but I thought that if I build this thing that's cool, and I can program it just by plugging in a screen and keyboard, then I would be more likely to actually do so.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Barney »

Oh, I'm getting one for my cab. Currently running an rPi 3B+ in there, the Pi4 should wipe the floor with it.

And when the handheld makers have cracked the battery issue, I'll grab one of those too :)
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by Baggypants »

I'm going to get one for my Zynthian. OB-Xd pushes the CPU of the 3+ and you can't go near adding any effects to it.
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Re: Raspberry Pi

Post by IronGiant »

Looks like the Pi 4 has a USB-C problem:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/07 ... -chargers/
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