Raspberry Pi - Any must have accessories??

[G W]

 

 

Random Thought: Why does the word m a s s i v e get star'd out??

Also the word a s s uming.

[Teken]

Also the word a s s uming.

 

Never mind I just realized after you wrote your reply why the filter is scrambling: a s s

 

Back on topic: I understand the latest RPi requires more power than its previous generation brother of 700 mA. I notice a few people using 2000 mA power supplies. Since only a few will be remote and will be doing A/V I believe purchasing a 3000 mA power supply will be better in the long run.

 

I am going with a powered USB HUB to power the RPi tower stack for a cleaner install and for wire management.

[MFBra]

This thread should have been here. It seems to be hard for people to navigate to.

http://forum.universal-devices.com/forum/87-raspberry-pi/

Thanks i Looked into the wiki and don't really know why i haven't looked into the 3 party. (my mistake)

[larryllix]

Never mind I just realized after you wrote your reply why the filter is scrambling: a s s

 

Back on topic: I understand the latest RPi requires more power than its previous generation brother of 700 mA. I notice a few people using 2000 mA power supplies. Since only a few will be remote and will be doing A/V I believe purchasing a 3000 mA power supply will be better in the long run.

 

I am going with a powered USB HUB to power the RPi tower stack for a cleaner install and for wire management.

I doubt a USB hub will run the Rpi. Most are limited to 500mA  per port and I believe that isn't enough, especially if you start dropping I/F add-ons on the board, like 1Wire etc. Try for a PSU that puts out 5.25-5.35 vdc as the fine wires in a microUSB cable has some voltage drop in it. MicroUSB was never designed for these higher currents with the fine wires and contact strips in the connectors.

[Teken]

I've found a few high output USB HUBS during a quick search. What I should have said is I am looking for a high output USB charger / battery pack.

 

I guess it comes down to size and form factor that I am looking for at the moment. Seen a few that are plugin bricks that have four 2.1 amp ports. Depending upon the number of ports these units output 30 - 65 watts.

 

Has anyone come across a GPIO style (stackable) wifi card for the RPi? Also looking for a NFC GPIO stackable card too.

 

After reviewing some of the requirements for one project it's apparent not all of the I/O devices will fit into one RPi in its credit card form factor.

 

 

Ideals are peaceful - History is violent

[larryllix]

My Canakit came with a USB WiFi dongle which works well except it doesn't like invisible SSIDs and keeps forgetting it and getting disconnected.

 

The dongle is not as plug'n play as the plug in Ethernet with built in driver in the OSes.

 

I am beginning to think I should go your route with the downloaded noobs or OS and burn my own SD card. I have found very little on help forums that ever seems to work with the supplied noob I have. The commands used on help forums are very seldom found to work and I have switched back and forth between Raspbian and Arch about 6 times now only to find problems and lack of clarity which and where the help instructions are based from. The auto-update for ArchLinux completely bricks my unit everytime I have started from scratch  fresh.

 

There is a lot of information out there but very little clarity of which is being used/referred to between OSes command lines, RPi versions,  Python versions and resource databases. Most are not compatible with each other. The fog is slowly lifting

[Teken]

My Canakit came with a USB WiFi dongle which works well except it doesn't like invisible SSIDs and keeps forgetting it and getting disconnected.

 

The dongle is not as plug'n play as the plug in Ethernet with built in driver in the OSes.

 

I am beginning to think I should go your route with the downloaded noobs or OS and burn my own SD card. I have found very little on help forums that ever seems to work with the supplied noob I have. The commands used on help forums are very seldom found to work and I have switched back and forth between Raspbian and Arch about 6 times now only to find problems and lack of clarity which and where the help instructions are based from. The auto-update for ArchLinux completely bricks my unit everytime I have started from scratch  fresh.

 

There is a lot of information out there but very little clarity of which is being used/referred to between OSes command lines, RPi versions,  Python versions and resource databases. Most are not compatible with each other. The fog is slowly lifting

 

I do recall one thread where you indicated the above as well. My fear is that I may become overwhelmed in my pursuit when there is very little clarity or information to follow.

 

I know lots of this starts off with a good mind set and positive attitude about learning new things. But, sometimes after wading through weeks of random forum threads in the Interwebs really starts to get old quick! This is why I appreciate so much when others take the time to document their specific journey and how each step of the project was accomplished.

 

Whether that be listing a BOM (build of materials) or links to software / firmware. To steps to execute a specific command for the Noob trying to follow this new environment. I am sure with the help of you and many others most of my goals and questions will be answered in the not too distant future.

 

EBAY indicates the various parts should arrive in the next 2-3 weeks from China. Right now its taking a few nights to review on line video's and forum threads to get a better understanding of what is to come. I have to say I am pretty proud of myself in being able to purchase 90% of the gear almost free!

 

I sold a few NOS electronic parts last month so the funds were redirected into this RPi project. The best thing is all of this was in USD currency so I didn't have to take a hit on exchange etc. I am unsure if the Chinese Government subsidizes shipping for some of these companies.

 

But have no freaking clue how they are able to ship things clear across the ocean for free!?!? Everyone has to make a profit and some of the parts I purchased in my eyes did not cost a lot when compared to local items in NA. I guess time will tell if this was a good investment or a financial bust in some of the purchases.

 

Ha . . . 

[bipto]

Being on a Mac, I used the Mac's DiskUtility for this.  It works just fine ***uming the destination card is equal to or larger in capacity.  By "equal to" I mean IDENTICAL.  I tried to restore an image taken from a Trancend 32Gb card to a Sandisk Ultra 32Gb card and failed as the block count was slightly lower on the Sandisk card.  Ended up having to manually create the partitions and rsync each over to the new card. That worked but was a pain.  I would recommend setting a standard for the card brand, type and size and have some extras on hand to clone to when needed.

 

-Xathros

@ Xathros et al

 

So I've been tinkering with my Pi2 for a couple of weeks now, and I'm thinking it's time to "put it in to production" as an ISYLink host.  I'm looking to heed the advice above and purchase a handful of microSD's.  Curious... what speeds should I be considering..?  In shopping around I see Class 10 seems to be the sweet-spot for performance / price / availability...  Can the Pi2 make use of cards faster than class 10..?  Will cards slower than class 10 significantly degrade performance..?

 

Thanks to all for the input to this thread - I'm learning a whole bunch here.  Guess you can teach an old dog new tricks after all..        

[Xathros]

I believe class 10 is faster than the Pi so no point in going higher.

 

 

-Xathros

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Teken]

@ Xathros et al

 

So I've been tinkering with my Pi2 for a couple of weeks now, and I'm thinking it's time to "put it in to production" as an ISYLink host.  I'm looking to heed the advice above and purchase a handful of microSD's.  Curious... what speeds should I be considering..?  In shopping around I see Class 10 seems to be the sweet-spot for performance / price / availability...  Can the Pi2 make use of cards faster than class 10..?  Will cards slower than class 10 significantly degrade performance..?

 

Thanks to all for the input to this thread - I'm learning a whole bunch here.  Guess you can teach an old dog new tricks after all..        

 

Class 10 should really be the lowest you should buy. Given the price difference these days you can't go wrong. Also, should you ever want to repurpose that Micro SD card into a smartphone, camera, what ever it will just perform much better.

 

I would definitely stick with a good known brand like Transcend, Sandisk, Kingston, etc. 

[bipto]

I believe class 10 is faster than the Pi so no point in going higher.

 

 

-Xathros

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

 

Class 10 should really be the lowest you should buy. Given the price difference these days you can't go wrong. Also, should you ever want to repurpose that Micro SD card into a smartphone, camera, what ever it will just perform much better.

 

I would definitely stick with a good known brand like Transcend, Sandisk, Kingston, etc. 

 

Done and done.  THIS looked like a reasonable deal...

 

Thanks!

--Bill

[Teken]

8 threw 32 GB at Amazon is a great price. What are your plans for storage a few 8 GB for the lowest price and then you can swap out cards based on OS / Needs? Or purchase a few larger 32 GB Micro SD cards for long term use? I opted for 32 GB cards because if I needed to repurpose them for my camera, or dash cam, I wouldn't have to worry about running out of space.

[bipto]

8 threw 32 GB at Amazon is a great price. What are your plans for storage a few 8 GB for the lowest price and then you can swap out cards based on OS / Needs? Or purchase a few larger 32 GB Micro SD cards for long term use? I opted for 32 GB cards because if I needed to repurpose them for my camera, or dash cam, I wouldn't have to worry about running out of space.

 

I actually do not have any other microSD devices that I could envision repurposing these for, and based on the free-space witnessed while tinkering so far it seemed that 8G was a pretty reasonable capacity for my current intentions.  I ended up picking up a half dozen along with another Pi2 so that I could continue tinkering, LOL...  I foresee coming up with some sort of system to archive images for my "production" Pi's where I could burn another card quickly in case of failure, and as I continue to explore more possible Pi uses I could definitely see me swapping cards with various combinations of OS's & software... 

[paulbates]

Bill, I have a similar dev / prod model. Configuration and fiddling on one, run the house automation on the other.

 

Another thing to note is moving changes using winscp and putty, Changes can quickly move from "dev" to "prod" across the network from one to the other. 

 

I haven't tried this yet, but its on the list. Its a set of steps to live image the card while the pi is running. If it works, it avoids downing the pis and pulling the card to make an image. I can image it to a NAS, and then build the new card a leisure on a PC. If it works, I will look at scheduling an image back up once a week or so.

[bipto]

Bill, I have a similar dev / prod model. Configuration and fiddling on one, run the house automation on the other.

 

Another thing to note is moving changes using winscp and putty, Changes can quickly move from "dev" to "prod" across the network from one to the other. 

 

I haven't tried this yet, but its on the list. Its a set of steps to live image the card while the pi is running. If it works, it avoids downing the pis and pulling the card to make an image. I can image it to a NAS, and then build the new card a leisure on a PC. If it works, I will look at scheduling an image back up once a week or so.

 

Yeah, that could work...

 

These little things are intoxicating.  6 months ago I barely realized their existence... now I'm questioning how I ever lived without one... pretty soon I'll likely be exploring the use of multiples in an automatic fail-over model!    

[Teken]

Any particular project you have in mind? One RPi is being deployed to make a dumb TV into a smart TV. Which will allow me to stream over A/V content not available from my Apple TV box.

 

 

Ideals are peaceful - History is violent

[paulbates]

Its also worth searching this board on the topic of raspberrypi / Rpi, and looking at the rpi forum area. A number of others have paved the way on rpi going back into early / mid 2012.

 

Paul

[G W]

I'm so happy to see that I am not the only programmer that cannot spell.

[builderb]

If you are clustering your pis, a leviton 4-port usb outlet replacement for an existing outlet is a good way to reduce your power supply mess, and at $25 is cheaper than 4 $10 power supplies.

 

Also, if you use iOS, I cannot recommend Prompt 2 highly enough for quick ssh access from phone or tablet.

 

I also use a cheap GPIO header with my 1-wire controller now. Initially I had to pull the case top off to install it, but this makes a cleaner install.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Teken]

If you are clustering your pis, a leviton 4-port usb outlet replacement for an existing outlet is a good way to reduce your power supply mess, and at $25 is cheaper than 4 $10 power supplies.

 

Also, if you use iOS, I cannot recommend Prompt 2 highly enough for quick ssh access from phone or tablet.

 

I also use a cheap GPIO header with my 1-wire controller now. Initially I had to pull the case top off to install it, but this makes a cleaner install.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

I had already considered one of several USB power outlets but it would limit AC use when required. At this point I am using everything I have on hand first to get a good handle of how and where I want the equipment to go.

 

While others like the RPi for the dumb TV obviously requires a single dedicated PSU, WiFi, case, VESA mount etc. I just installed a copy of Kodi (XBMC) for Windows on a low power netbook. After a few hours of playing around and watching a few on line video's I think XBMC will fit perfectly with the media goal for this one RPi.

 

Life's about small milestones and accomplishments . . .

 

When the GF came home she was so excited to see one of the dumb TV's all networked and pushing on line content! After I told her this was just a small test and that the kludge on the floor was just validating some basic ideas.

 

There was nothing but hugs & kiss's and approval for the project.

 

I think what surprises her the most (sometimes) is that I plan really far ahead and have long lead times for projects. She knows I have been considering a fan less, low energy, multi purpose computer solution for many years. With the release of the RPi 2 many of my energy goals will materialize this year.

 

Lots of people have commented that they didn't think I could lower my energy consumption signature any lower. Given the fact I have been so aggressive in this area for several years. But I think with proper management, timing, and lower power devices like the RPi I should be able to shave off a few KWH per day, week, month, year with out issue.

 

Thanks for the suggestion for the iOS App *Prompt 2* I will surely take a look at this program when all of the parts arrive next month.

 

Once again much thanks to everyone who has provided feed back about random items, topics, or suggestions for this project. I know initial ask of this thread has wondered to many areas. But to me that is a good thing because it brings forth so many ideas and solutions I may not have known or considered before.

 

If anyone has suggestions for must have RPi Apps, programs, what have you please do chime in. Anything that will get me up and running faster is greatly appreciated.

[bipto]

My home media network was my last addiction project.  Ended up ditching multiple cable co HD DVR boxes and going with a centrally-located, low-power Windows Media Center equipped with a Ceton 6 tuner cable TV card, and a combination of Ceton extenders and Roku's for all of the satellite TV's.  Shaved my cable bill by almost $100/month.

 

I regret not knowing of the RPi and its media capabilities sooner or I might I have gone that route as well.  I don't believe there is any RPi solution for handling copyrighted broadcast content, but based on everything I've heard / read about XBMC, RPi would probably have been an equally-capable, lower-cost alternative to the Roku's.  I may yet set up an XBMC RPi to see what I'm missing...   

[paulbates]

I've been on the fringes of this one. I believe Apple will help us bust cable channels free from cable providers hands, and serve them over the internet. I would very much be an 'a la carte' candidate. Then a distributed system as you describe would be great. 

[bipto]

I've been on the fringes of this one. I believe Apple will help us bust cable channels free from cable providers hands, and serve them over the internet. I would very much be an 'a la carte' candidate. Then a distributed system as you describe would be great. 

 

Unlike many of my past and present "hobbies" (HA being one of them  ), it's an investment that can honestly realize a return if done right.  I broke even on my equipment cost months ago... 

[Teken]

My home media network was my last addiction project.  Ended up ditching multiple cable co HD DVR boxes and going with a centrally-located, low-power Windows Media Center equipped with a Ceton 6 tuner cable TV card, and a combination of Ceton extenders and Roku's for all of the satellite TV's.  Shaved my cable bill by almost $100/month.

 

I regret not knowing of the RPi and its media capabilities sooner or I might I have gone that route as well.  I don't believe there is any RPi solution for handling copyrighted broadcast content, but based on everything I've heard / read about XBMC, RPi would probably have been an equally-capable, lower-cost alternative to the Roku's.  I may yet set up an XBMC RPi to see what I'm missing...   

 

 

I've been on the fringes of this one. I believe Apple will help us bust cable channels free from cable providers hands, and serve them over the internet. I would very much be an 'a la carte' candidate. Then a distributed system as you describe would be great. 

 

Right now I am just testing out some of the great software that has been out for awhile. Like the ISY Browser Plugin for XBMC to finally bring some brains and automation to the whole movie experience.

 

I have been reading about this App for a while but never had a chance to try it out until now. Having the ability to set programs / scenes to a specific state based on the audio, video, start / end of XBMC launch is impressive.

 

No doubt with HBO being added in to the Apple TV along with many other A la carte programming. The media portion is going to be quite good for many people. Like many others I am not made of gold so can't be spending hundreds of dollars just for media.

 

The amount of media content I have been able to find in HD from TV shows, movies, music, etc is outstanding to say the least. I am more curious if the RPi will be able to provide the same performance as some of the dedicated devices I have on hand now.

 

I have a Pogo Plug which provides me unlimited remote / cloud storage. I am eager to see how the RPi does in this aspect as a NAS.

 

I also have a old school security DVR that requires a dedicated mail server to send out alerts. My plan is to dedicate one of these RPi's to that task and finally be able to make full use of all of this gear as it was intended.

 

Quick question for those who have a RPi now: What is the story about the MPEG4 license? Can someone explain to me what this RPi can't do in terms of rendering video?