A few years ago I wrote about his previous “Raspberry GPIO Xmas Tree Add-on” so Andrew Gale from PocketMoneyTronics.co.uk sent me his latest Christmas Tree kit for the Raspberry Pi. This version includes RGB LEDs which allow the tree to display a much larger range of colours with the benefit of adjustable brightness.
Author: Matt
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In order to measure the water level in my water butt I decided to try a waterproof ultrasonic distance measuring module. This operates in the same way as the standard ultrasonic modules I used in my previous Ultrasonic Distance Measurement Using Python tutorial.
When they aren’t selling add-on boards or taking sacks to the post office the people over at ModMyPi are inventing new Raspberry Pi products. Their latest home-grown product is a quad relay board. They sent me one to try out and although I received it for free it came with no conditions or restrictions. The following opinions are my own impartial thoughts.
Today the Raspberry Pi Foundation announced a major change to the desktop environment provided with the official Raspbian SD card image. The new environment is called PIXEL.
This mount allows you to mount a magnetic lens to the Raspberry Pi camera module. These magnetic lenses are sold as sets online for attaching to mobile phones. They are cheap and a great way to alter the standard Pi camera.
This basic object can be used to mount a Raspberry Pi camera using 2mm nylon bolts inside an IP67 junction box. It is 57.5mm wide and fits inside certain IP67 Sealed ABS Plastic Junction Box measuring 73x80x53mm.
I don’t often blog about other people’s projects but this is one that just needs talking about. This project is a miniature Nintendo NES games console complete with plug-in games cartridges. It is based on a Raspberry Pi B+ and runs Retropie software.
The BME280 device is a digital barometric pressure sensor and is a slightly upgraded version of the BMP180. This is available on a small module which provides access to the sensor via the I2C interface. This allows us to easily connect it to the Raspberry Pi and read the data using Python. The BME280 provides temperature, pressure and humidity.
RasPi.TV have recently launched another Kickstarter campaign for a new product. This is a natural follow-up to their successful GPIO reference ruler. The new GPIO Zero Ruler is twice the length and provides a handy reference to the “GPIO Zero” library. It includes Python code examples as well as the vital Raspberry Pi GPIO header pin reference. Alex kindly sent me one of these and like the 6 inch version it’s a high quality that you’ll find useful in all sorts of ways. The GPIO Zero Ruler campaign is already well past its funding goal but you can still back…
PiThe Raspberry Pi Zero has just been updated to include a camera connector like it’s bigger brothers. This is great news as it now opens up a whole new set of possibilities for the smallest member of the Raspberry Pi family. In order to connect a camera you will need a custom six-inch adapter cable. This converts from the fine-pitch connector format on the Zero to the coarser pitch used by the camera board. Photo from Official Raspberry Pi blog This increases the cost and will no doubt lead to some grumbling but being able to create an HD recording device…
RS Components have created this short video to present 5 project ideas that they hope will inspire other projects. My cat isn’t likely the look of idea #3! https://www.youtube.com/embed/ud6kP_kBn-0 Share your ideas and projects on Twitter using #MyRPi and you’ll maybe pick up some retweets. Brought to you by RS Components
The BBC Micro:bit is a small programmable computer that aims to help teach child how to experiment and play with technology rather than just use and consume it. It is manufactured by Farnell Element 14 and has finally been rolled out to UK schools for Year 7 (11 year olds). For obvious reasons people have wondered if it is a rival or alternative to the Raspberry Pi and whether it will fight for the attention of teachers and kids. Farnell were kind enough to send me one to try out. I’m clearly a fan of the Raspberry Pi so was interested…
Kano is a Raspberry Pi based computer kit aimed at children and was launched on Kickstarter in 2013. It comprises of a kit of parts which can be used with a set of software activities. In the UK the current price for the standard kit is £119.99 from the Kano site. The kit is also available from . Kano contacted me and asked if I wanted to take a look at the kit after the recent launch of the Pi 3. Under normal circumstances I would struggle to review this sort of product but I’ve got access to a small…
Today the Raspberry Pi Foundation has announced a new set of camera modules for the Raspberry Pi. The new devices contain a new Sony camera sensor and pack 8-megapixels into the same tiny board. As before there is a standard camera and one that is better suited for use with IR lights. The price remains the same at a reasonable $25.
My preferred method for writing an Raspberry Pi SD card image is a tool called Etcher. It is free, works on Windows, Linux and Mac and has a nice clean interface. The newer version even allows multiple SD cards to be written at the same time.
Everyone is familar with “Steve” the default Minecraft character and he looks very similar on all Minecraft platforms. It’s easy to change the Minecraft skin used to define how he looks and thanks to a few free sites you’ve got plenty to choose from.
UUGear have just released a new 7-port USB hub add-on board for the Raspberry Pi. It is an updated version of the device they released in 2014. It has the same footprint as the Pi and can be attached to all Raspberry Pi versions which currently includes Models A, B, A+, B+, 2B, 3B and Zero. Unlike most other Pi add-ons boards this product is designed to be mounted underneath the Pi which keeps the top surface free for messing about with GPIO pins and the camera interface.
7 segment displays are a well established way of electronically displaying numbers and a small set of letters. They’ve been around for as long as I’ve been playing with electronics but were a pain to wire up given the number of LEDs involved. Luckily things are a lot easier now that they are available on pre-made modules that uses an SPI interface. This is easy to setup and use on the Raspberry so for about £3 you can add a strip of 8 7 segment digits.
On Friday I sent off from Bristol to travel to Cambridge for the Raspberry Pi’s 4th Birthday weekend. Luckily my gamble with public transport paid off and I managed to get a seat for the entire journey. I read a few articles in the latest issue of The MagPi and learnt that some of the Pi 3 development was done at Aztec West in Bristol. This industrial estate isn’t far from my house so I felt a little bit closer the Pi.
With the release of the Pi 3 there has been an increase of chatter around heatsinks. The previous models really didn’t need one unless you were using it in an extreme environment. However the Pi 3’s increase in performance means it runs a little hotter and the case for using a heatsink is sightly more justifiable.
In this video you can learn how to get started with your Raspberry Pi 3 Model B. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLAblELXygA
In this video RS Components compare the Raspberry Pi 3 Model B with the Raspberry Pi 2 Model B. It gives you a technical and physical comparison of the Raspberry Pi 3 model B and Raspberry Pi 2 model B. There is also an overview on the new power supply and the latest NOOBS operating system, that you can buy pre-installed on a Micro-SD card from the RS Components website. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45Mls8BCgtE