Interesting. At the AHRS meeting Saturday last there was some discussion of putting opencv ( http://opencv.org ) on a rasberry pi. This could be a wonderful platform for your unstoppable robot army.
-- CHS On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 5:13 AM, Ron Frazier (TECHC) < [email protected]> wrote: > Hi all, > > (Also posting toDC-404 ) > > I know many of you are Raspberry Pi fans. I just got my first one > running, and I wanted to share some of the experience. Someone in another > thread mentioned Micro Center. And that's where I bought the unit, with > some accessories coming from Frys. > > My prior experience with Ubuntu helped a lot, since Raspbian, based on > Debian Wheezy, is very similar. Without that prior knowledge, I would have > found it a good bit more difficult to get acclimated. > > Just a few days ago, on July 14, a new and improved model was announced, > the Model B+. While it has the same 700 MHz processor and 512 MB of RAM, > it has a number of other newly enhanced features. After reading about it, > which happened to be very good timing, I decided to finally jump in and get > one to do experiments with, and I decided that I wanted the new one. > > The new unit has: 40 GPIO pins instead of 26, a more secure micro SD slot > instead of a full SD slot, 4 mounting holes instead of 2, 4 USB ports > instead of 2, lower intrinsic power consumption (not including > peripherals), better audio, and a neater form factor. > > Looking at the photos, it looks like they lost the composite video > function, but they've embedded that into the audio connector to save space > on the board. > > Here's their blog post: > > http://www.raspberrypi.org/introducing-raspberry-pi-model-b-plus/ > > The 1st 26 GPIO pins are the same electrically as the Model B rev 2. So, > many things designed for the old one will work with the new one. However, > the layout of everything on the board has changed, so things which depend > on the physical configuration, like add on boards which mate closely with > the PI board, may not work. Old cases will not work. Some GPIO breakout > tools will not work. > > The same software that ran on the Model B rev 2 will work. However, you > need to update your OS Kernel. In my case, I just downloaded the latest > NOOBS software from the foundation and installed it. I chose to put > Raspbian and RISC on the memory card. > > I had to fight with the thing a while to get my Belkin F5D7050 v3xxx usb > wifi adapter working, but I finally got it going. > > Then, I got a chance to play with it for a while. I had never used LXDE > before. But, it's not too bad. Kind of like the Gnome 2 which I got used > to, and liked, on Ubuntu. > > The Pi is not primarily intended to be a desktop pc. But, surprisingly > with 512 MB of RAM, it actually does pretty good at that. I spent a while > working with the Midori web browser with scripting turned off. According > to the task manager, only about 80 MB of RAM was in use not counting the > cache. That leaves a good bit for other applications to run. I've > installed the synaptic package manager and then the GO programming > language. It comes with Python and Scratch. And, I think Ruby was already > installed. > > When browsing text only websites or sites with a moderate number of > images, the performance is fairly snappy. For sites with many images, or > very large images, the cpu can peg at 100% and the system can destabilize. > But, again, it's not a $ 1000 gaming machine. But, for lightweight > desktop usage, I'm really impressed. Of course, what I bought it for is to > make use of those cool GPIO pins to actually control some experiments. > This is way better than an fpga because you can custom program it. Also, > it's really handy to have access to conventional networking tools and a > conventional file system while configuring your experiment. That's why I > chose this instead of PIC, Propeller, Picaxe, Basic Stamp, and even Arduino. > > It's billed as a $ 35 computer, but you really have to add to that to make > it work. Counting the Pi, memory card, power supply (5V, 2A), USB power > cable, hdmi cable, and two PI related bookazines; I'm into the project > about $ 120. I'm providing a keyboard, mouse, and wifi adapter that I > already had. If I had to buy all that, it would probably add about $ 50 to > the project. One website I read mentioned that you can get a keyboard with > built in touchpad to save using up one USB port. Of course, you can add a > powered USB hub if the 4 ports provided are not enough. The power supply > that runs the unit cannot provide much power to peripherals. > > Later, I'll probably end up buying a circuit breadboard, breadboarding > jumper wires, a 4.3" monitor so I don't have to always have the big one > attached, a power supply for said monitor, a video cable, a PI case, a USB > cable with a power switch, possibly an external power supply, some sensors, > some drivers / buffers, and some project specific parts like coils and > motors and magnets. > > I spent many hours on Amazon looking at hundreds of products related to > the Pi. When I have some time, and after some sleep, I hope to sort > through those and post the best ones. The Model B+ is so new, most of the > accessory manufacturers haven't adapted to the new board yet. I'm sure > they'll catch up pretty quickly though. > > I'm really excited to see what this mini computer can do. > > Sincerely, > > Ron > > > -- > > (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to > call on the phone. I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy > mailing lists and such. I don't always see new email messages very > quickly.) > > Ron Frazier > 770-205-9422 (O) Leave a message. > linuxdude AT techstarship.com > > _______________________________________________ > tech-chat mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.linuxmoose.com/mailman/listinfo/tech-chat >
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