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USB stick PC for $25 — Parallax Forums

USB stick PC for $25

HollyMinkowskiHollyMinkowski Posts: 1,398
edited 2011-09-07 01:35 in General Discussion
ARM 11 at 700Mhz.
128mb ram.
1080p video
SD slot
USB peripherals

Pretty sweet!
That ugly block stuck on top is a camera module.
rasperry_pi_pcb-580x435.jpg
http://www.geek.com/articles/games/game-developer-david-braben-creates-a-usb-stick-pc-for-25-2011055/

Comments

  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-05-06 15:49
    Amazing. And it runs Linux.

    We finally have a way to run Linux on the Propeller.

    Just glue one of those to the top of a DIP Propeller chip and voila!, you have Linux running on the Propeller:)
  • LeonLeon Posts: 7,620
    edited 2011-05-06 15:52
    I don't believe the $25 price!
  • ColeyColey Posts: 1,112
    edited 2011-05-06 16:01
    more here.....
    on the BBC

    ARM will take over the world without us even realising it.....
  • HollyMinkowskiHollyMinkowski Posts: 1,398
    edited 2011-05-06 16:26
    ARM is fast, cheap and everywhere.

    But get used to doing a lot of work with interrupts.
    And get out your Hot Air equipment and solder paste
    cause this is a sm hobby.

    Actually, a good BGA re-work station with microscope is a good idea.

    Acorn RISC Machine
    Advanced RISC Machine

    One of the two original designers is female...there's girl power in the ARM :-)
  • ForrestForrest Posts: 1,341
    edited 2011-05-06 17:00
    I'm don't believe the price either. You'll probably need to buy a million to get that pricing. How much to buy one?

    If you want to buy a small linux computer today, Best Buy is closing out the 3.5 inch Insignia Media player (Chumby One clone) for $50. It doesn't include 1080p video, but it does come with a 802.11g wireless card and a 320 x 240 pixel color touchscreen.
  • UnknownUnknown
    edited 2011-05-06 17:00
    Leon wrote: »
    I don't believe the $25 price!

    Apparently it is part of the one laptop per child initiative and it is called Raspberry Pi:

    http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Raspberry-Pi-David-Braben-Ubuntu-9-OLPC-Railroad-Tycoon,12709.html
  • Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) Posts: 23,514
    edited 2011-05-06 17:14
    I saw that earlier this morning. There are some open questions

    1. What's with the male USB connector if, as the article suggests, the board can host a USB keyboard?
    2. Where is the network interface? The article mentions Facebook and Twitter, but I don't see an Ethernet port.

    It's a cool device if they can pull it off for the stated price. But I think we're still waiting for the bell on the oven to go off at this point.

    -Phil
  • UnknownUnknown
    edited 2011-05-06 17:21
    Phil, they aren't showing the underside of the board.
  • localrogerlocalroger Posts: 3,452
    edited 2011-05-06 17:31
    On the slashdot thread about this it was suggested that it's getting power from the HDMI cable and is plugged into a USB hub which has a USB ethernet bridge as well as a keyboard. Of course, that makes it a little less impressive as a standalone solution; you don't need more gear to use a OLPC PC.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-05-07 02:31
    Leon,
    I don't believe the $25 price!

    Sounds fantastic I know. However I recently bought three of these ARM boards:
    http://shop.igep.es/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=40

    A bit bigger admittedly and 6 times the price but then they do come with 4 times more RAM, WIFI, Bluetooth, ethernet and a bunch of other stuff.

    So I'm guessing that 25 dollars in quantity is not so far off.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-09-02 01:44
    Check out the Raspberry PI progress again. They are steaming ahead. Price seems to have nudged upwards to between $25 and $35 and the board is looking a bit bigger.
    Can't wait.
    I want to soon be running the GCC C compiler for the Propeller on that tiny board so you have the whole Prop and dev kit in a weeny package.
  • TorTor Posts: 2,010
    edited 2011-09-02 02:29
    HollyMinkowski wrote: »
    ARM is fast, cheap and everywhere.

    But get used to doing a lot of work with interrupts.
    And get out your Hot Air equipment and solder paste
    cause this is a sm hobby.

    Actually, a good BGA re-work station with microscope is a good idea.

    Acorn RISC Machine
    Advanced RISC Machine

    One of the two original designers is female...there's girl power in the ARM :-)
    Sophie Wilson.. the gender issue is slightly more complex than that, but she's been called "the best 6502 programmer ever", among other things. From this article about Acorn, BBC Basic, ARM design:
    Acorn's CEO at the time, Hermann Hauser, recalls that "while IBM spent months simulating their instruction sets on large mainframes, Sophie did it all in her brain."

    About the raspberry pi.. looks great, but then again I buy anything and everything tech that's below $36 because then I avoid all the costly problematic VAT and additional charges issues when shipping to my country. So the possible $35 price mentioned is still great, as far as I'm concerned :-)

    -Tor
  • RavenkallenRavenkallen Posts: 1,057
    edited 2011-09-02 11:55
    Whoaaa... Just found out about this project today. This might really change things in the computer world. Yesterdays PC's are today's microcontrollers:)
  • John A. ZoidbergJohn A. Zoidberg Posts: 514
    edited 2011-09-03 00:48
    Whoa. That's pretty powerful. I would do a lot more on it!

    And it's $25! :)
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-03 01:31
    There is a question of WHICH Linux. The great divide is between with GUI and without GUI. Without GUI, it would easily compliment a PocketTerminal, which is a Propeller driven VT100 emulation. But it seems to support Ubuntu Linux including GUI.

    Unlike Windows, Linux can be set up without GUI in order to reduce the footprint. One of the primary attractions to such a small Linux is it can easily handle multiple users logging in with different rights.

    But from my own experience, it may be like taking a Ferrari to the supermarket. There are a lot of tasks that don't justify a full blown Linux system or any OS with files and such. IF you want a very specific deterministic outcome, Linux is just a distraction. And interrupts rather than parallel processing is just dancing to another tune.

    Another nice Linux Board with GUI is the BeagleBoard. It is all the rage these days as it is small and pretty much will allow you to use it to access the WWW. Also, you can use memory sticks for 16GB and 32GB of storage.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-03 01:58
    http://www.raspberrypi.org/?p=78

    Already morphing into another board - The Raspberry Pi Alpha Board. $25 still seems to be possible
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-09-03 02:17
    Loopy,
    One probably does not want to use linux for those time critical tasks that we do with propellers. A board like that probably does not have as much gpio capability either. But think how wonderfull it would be to have a board like that with a prop or two on it as well.
    The ARM takes care of your file store, networking, wireless, USB, securtity etc etc. All those things linux is good at.
    The Props provide your real world interfacing.
    As a bonus you can develop all your code on the board as well. No PC required.
    With these ever decreasing prices soon everyone of your projects could be it's own development system.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-03 10:11
    @Heater
    So all we need to do is have the Linux file system store executable files to be loaded and swapped out of the Propeller, right? I like the idea and I do like the board as well. I have be working very hard NOT to buy a BeagleBoard and now this comes along! I love Linux and Unix as they provide just about everything one could wish for in free applications.
    The 'one child one laptop' concept would be dead without LINUX.
  • TorTor Posts: 2,010
    edited 2011-09-03 10:17
    I applaud that they went for full-size SD cards on the Alpha.. as he said in the video: They're just too small. They get lost etc.
    SD cards fit in a pocket in my wallet, but all wallets I've ever had have this little opening in those pockets.. just large enough for microSD to drop out.
    MicroSD works fine enough if you only need it for permanent, never-replaced storage. For everything else full-size SD is just so much nicer. And cheaper, and larger capacity, and much larger selection in the shop. And that's why I much prefer my original Beagleboard compared to the newer Beagleboard Xm: Xm has microSD.

    -Tor
  • $WMc%$WMc% Posts: 1,884
    edited 2011-09-03 12:54
    This was in Nuts&Volts Aug.2011 issue pg 11
    '
    The title of the article was "BOTTOM OF THE BARREL"
    '
    The Indian Institute of Technology & Science is about to release a Touch screen micro-PC for $35
    If they can get their stuff together.
    '
    The raspberrypi is pretty neat for the price.
    '
    www.raspberrypi.org
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-09-04 01:41
    Loopy,
    Well, Prop development would be done much as it is now. Except all the tools will be running on your ARM/Prop board instead of your PC.
    Sadly the Prop tool is Windows only but BST could be built for ARM, BradC willing. Alternatively the HomeSpun Spin compiler can be run on ARM Linux using the mono C# run time. I have already done that on a IGEP ARM board which is much like a Beagle board. Then we should be able to get Andrey's PZST Spin IDE running on ARM as well.
    Soon the new propeller GCC compiler will be useable on ARM as well.
    A bonus here is that the finished product out in the field can upgrade the Prop code autonomously or change the Prop program on the fly as required.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-04 01:56
    BST is okay.

    I'd be interested if Catalina could be used in this particular Linux. But I have also had my eye on the BeagleBoard XM, which has twice the RAM and claims 3-D video. Of course it is quite a bit more money at about $150USD. These will NOT go on sale immediately and I already see that they are offering A and B versions as different costs: B will have the higher 256meg ram and the LAN interfact and will cost more than $25. And it seems that somehow, the camera seems to have vanished from the proposal.

    With all that added detail, I am a bit more wary. I don't have to have the smallest device or the cheapest. It is equally important that it has the support of a decent FREE C cross-compiler, or the Linux is nearly useless someone like Ubuntu isn't keeping a complete repository for everything you wish to have.

    If I had the tiniest LInux computer there is, the dog might eat it. That wouldn't be good..... for the dog.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-09-04 02:26
    Loopy,
    Seems I have to find time for some more experiments with my IGEP ARM board. I'm sure Catalina could be compiled to run there. Catalina is now integrated into the Code:Blocks graphical IDE which as it happens already runs just fine under Ubuntu on the IGEP.
    There is no problem with cross compilers for ARM linux however I have found that I can do all my compilations on the ARM board itself. I only have a 4GB SD card on that board which is quite full with Ubuntu but when I need space for building things it's only a case of plugging in my 1Tb USB hard drive or using file shares over the network.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-04 03:50
    Well, I am happy to hear that Catalina is possible. Simply put, there has been a 'sea change' is C cross-compilers for AVR and ARM. There have been a lot of good Linux products that have wasted away without a market because you had to pay big bucks - hundreds if not thousands of USD - to cross-compile for their chips.

    But in the past few years, good FREE cross-compilers have made these new Linux computers possible. And with SDcards and USB sticks for mass storage, the suite is pretty much complete.

    One thought that came to mind. Parallax's new Lithium battery power pack will nicely work with the Raspberry Pi if you want rechargeable batteries.

    The BeagleBoard has a touch screen, a box, an expansion board (for your Propeller), and a battery package all integrated - but suddenly it ain't so cheap, maybe $900USD and shipping.

    I see Raspberry Pi is promoting 'Buy one and give one to someone'. It is a nice concept, but immediately doubles the price. Of course, your order might be expedited if you do so. But I am still waiting for the dust to settle and to see how these really enter the market of the everyday world. Right now it is a media event.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2011-09-04 05:01
    Loopy,

    Where have you been?
    I have been developing small embedded systems with PowerPC and ARM processors for pretty much all of this century. Of course you could buy your ARM or PPC Linux and development tools from companies like MontaVista but the things you need to roll your own have been around for a long time, BusyBox since 1996, buildroot since about 2000. Not so sure when avr-gcc arrived though but it seems like ages ago that I first used it.

    I also have some reservations about how the Raspberry PI will turn out and if it will flourish. But I think the point here is that systems like this will be made by somebody, somewhere, There are already the Beagle board, IGEP board and a few other around. The prices can only drop. So if you base your projects on such a Linux system it's pretty much sure to be movable to similar devices in the future. The hardware design is open sourced anyway.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-04 08:04
    Where have I been? Would you believe in Taiwan since 1994. And I really only became an avid Linux user since I got an EEEpc 4G. I think that was about 4 years ago.

    BusyBox is a great collaborative software. Linux routers are another interesting item. But I am still learning a lot.
  • prof_brainoprof_braino Posts: 4,313
    edited 2011-09-04 09:32
    Loopy Byteloose wrote: »
    The 'one child one laptop' concept would be dead without LINUX.

    Off topic, but since you brought it up, The 'one child one laptop' concept would be dead without FORTH. :)

    http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Open_Firmware
    http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OFW_FAQ
    http://wiki.laptop.org/go/FORTH

    Back on topic, I'm getting one come November!
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2011-09-07 01:35
    I have been rereading the BeagleBoard specifications and then returning to this. I suspect I will buy at least one in November. It is just too reasonably priced to pass up. One could get six Raspberry Pi computers for the price of one BeagleBoardXM.
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