Raspberry pi

Imnoexpert_2

Son who is a good coder and who I have asked questions about before wants a pi for Christmas.

I,have seen the kits on ebay but just wondered if there is any buying advice on here about what apart from the kits with pi, housing and a 16gb so card you can usefully have. I reckon network and hdmi cable and cheap keyboard but anything else or other advice?

Thanks

dipsomaniac

check that you haven't got the cables in a drawer before buying a kit. most people have lan, hdmi and micro usbs lying around if not the pound shops sell them.

i haven't paid more than £28 for a pi 3 on ebay or at the pi store where they often have a 10% sale. you don't need a fancy case with cooling. i buy the clear plastic cases for around £3.50 on ebay. make sure you get a class10 micro sd card.

[Deleted User]

Have you got a monitor/TV to plug it into? Mouse, keyboard, USB charger, microSD card, HDMI cable - that's everything you'll need to get started.

We bought an RPi3 + clear case from Amazon for £32 a while ago, it's £35 now.

Now, my son got a laptop for his birthday so the Pi has been re-purposed into a retro games console. Two USB games controllers cost £15.

psychic_teabag

You defintely need a power supply and an sdcard - a USB charger would do.

You don't *necessarily* need monitor/keyboard/mouse - I have a couple that I operate entirely headlessly - just connect in over the network when I need access. Obviously, keyboard and screen are useful temporarily when first setting it up .

And I don't bother with cases (though did get one of freecycle when someone offered).

If you want to attach USB peripherals, you might need a powered usb hub - the one I have, one power supply feeds both the hub and (from there) the pi. (I still have the original model, which couldn't provide much power for usb peripherals. Don't know if the newer models are better at that.)

[Deleted User]

I forgot - a microSD card reader is also a bit essential, to setup the microSD card with the right build

System

psychic_teabag wrote: »

You defintely need a power supply and an sdcard - a USB charger would do.

A general USB charger won't do in many cases. The Raspberry Pi needs a 2.5A at 5V supply, even USB is 900mA and tops out at 1.5A for charging. Many USB chargers won't do 2.5A, most supply at most 2A. If you're using your Pi and see a lightning symbol on the screen this is because the PSU can't supply enough current.

WobblyDog

If you want to try interfacing the Pi to external sensors, DS18B20 temperature sensors cost less than £5, you will need a 4.7K resistor as well. A PIR motion sensor costs about the same. Once you start down that route, you will probably want to buy a Pi Cobbler board, soldering iron, breadboard, etc. The Pi camera adds a lot of functionality, but costs about £20.

Imnoexpert_2

Thanks guys.

I think I am just going to get the starter kit from Amazon.

I guess for an aspiring Tecky like him half the fun will be finding out what else he needs and how to solve the problems. And future birthday christmases and his own income from his programming can go towards expansion like sensors and usb hubs.

Just a quick extra. We have a wired network and a wireless router. How easy or sensible will it be for him (us) to link the pi to his pc so he can operate it from his main pc and keyboard without having to attach separate keybord and screen to the pi. in other words I suppose to add it as a network location?

psychic_teabag

Tarambor wrote: »

A general USB charger won't do in many cases. The Raspberry Pi needs a 2.5A at 5V supply, even USB is 900mA and tops out at 1.5A for charging. Many USB chargers won't do 2.5A, most supply at most 2A. If you're using your Pi and see a lightning symbol on the screen this is because the PSU can't supply enough current.

From the official pi page...

Typically, the model B uses between 700-1000mA depending on what peripherals are connected; the model A can use as little as 500mA with no peripherals attached. The maximum power the Raspberry Pi can use is 1 Amp. If you need to connect a USB device that will take the power requirements above 1 Amp, then you must connect it to an externally-powered USB hub.

That said, I've been running an rpi as a 24/7 media centre for a few years now, and power supplies have been a problem - two from a (reputedly) reliable source have failed. But they are having to power a disk, and the freeview tuner card turns out to use more power than expected. My current 4A supply seems to be doing better.

psychic_teabag

Imnoexpert wrote: »

Just a quick extra. We have a wired network and a wireless router. How easy or sensible will it be for him (us) to link the pi to his pc so he can operate it from his main pc and keyboard without having to attach separate keybord and screen to the pi. in other words I suppose to add it as a network location?

Very easy indeed. Whether it's sensible depends entirely on what you're doing with it. But if you have a pc, I'd agree that it's simpler to operate it remotely than to have a second kbd/screen (or use switching).

Models other than the Zero come with an ethernet port. The model 3 also comes with wifi, or you can get a usb wifi connector to use with an older model.

Most ethernet devices these days are auto-sensing, so you can just run a cable between them and have a private network. Or plug everything into your home network, either wired or wireless, and communicate that way.

You would need a keyboard/screen temporarily if using a NOOBS image (see https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/faqs/ ), since that will interact with screen. If you boot directly into raspian, I can't remember if ssh over ethernet works out-of-the-box. If not, or if you need to configure wireless access, you'd need a screen temporarily.

WobblyDog

Imnoexpert wrote: »

Thanks guys.

Just a quick extra. We have a wired network and a wireless router. How easy or sensible will it be for him (us) to link the pi to his pc so he can operate it from his main pc and keyboard without having to attach separate keybord and screen to the pi. in other words I suppose to add it as a network location?

I use Microsoft RDP to remotely connect to my Pi, because it's permanent installed in my garage monitoring various things. I had to install XRDP on the Pi, but it has worked faultlessly since then.