Raspberry Pi... £37 or less: a bargain...

Got a couple of RPi's, a older one and a newer 512MB one. I had quite a few issues installing raspbmc and these were all related to the SD card I was using. raspbmc does not like micro-SD cards and it was lawys corrupting the image. I now run it off a 4GB SD card and it seems ok. I needed to buy the MPEG-2 license to play you VOB files, and at a cost of £2.40 I am not sure if I could afford it :).

I have also stuck a heat sink on the processor, which obviously keeps the temps down, but apart from that, installed the app, connected to my library and it just works. Great thing is it supports the CEC protocol so can be controlled by my TV remote, so no need for keyboard or mouse.

As an aside a friend has installed some PABX software one his RPi, and that is a very interesting project. Basically he has sent ip phones to his family across the world, and as long as they have internet access they just dial an internal extension number to call each other, like skype but so much clearer and better. He even has a local number tied into it, so "9" for an external line and you have a local UK number. The possibilities are endless...

All for a £30 piece of hardware!
 
Quick question. Where is the best place to buy one of these and what other bits and bobs am I likely to need?

I work in IT so I'm really just after one to mess about with trying different things in my spare time.
 
I got mine from CPC ([-]RS Components[/-] Farnell) and I got the plastic case, a USB 1A power supply (from CPC), and then a class 4 8GB SD card from Tesco for £7. You will need a HDMI cable but you can get those anywhere. In supply now, and came withing a few days
 
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What is the actual delivered price now Cyland? because I think the thread title could do with updating :)
 
erm.... not 100% sure, as a mate got it for me, but I just checked the CPC website (correction they are Farnell, not RS Components) and if you order 1 with delivery charges etc, it comes to £37. So yes quite a way off the £16 in the title.
 
Still a bargain :thumbsup: so I won't change that :) was that for the bare board or did you include anything else? It looks like RS are doing it for £25.92 but I don't think that includes delivery.
 
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erm.... not 100% sure, as a mate got it for me, but I just checked the CPC website (correction they are Farnell, not RS Components) and if you order 1 with delivery charges etc, it comes to £37. So yes quite a way off the £16 in the title.

I got an email from RS recently saying cost now is £35, so that seems about right.
 
Agreed, hence I have 2. It costs more for a night out in the pub now-a-days
 
It looks like RS are doing it for £25.92 on their site but I don't think that includes delivery. Was the £37 from CPC for the bare board or did you include anything else?
 
Just the bare board delivered... here's how they break it down:
Goods Subtotal: £24.96
Handling Charge: £5.95
VAT: £6.18
Order Total: £37.09
 
If you add it to the basket it adds the "Handling Charge" in, probably to do with the total value of the basket. Not sure if there is a minimum order where they wave this charge....
 
Its far removed from when they first came out and were going well over £100.
I've only ever used mine for an XBMC media streamer. And my Xbox does that anyway so I'm struggling to find something else for mine to do.
 
Cyland101 said:
If you add it to the basket it adds the "Handling Charge" in, probably to do with the total value of the basket. Not sure if there is a minimum order where they wave this charge....

I can't add to a basket on farnell it just says place order. It breaks down to total £24.96 vat £4.99 and has a note underneath saying the price is inclusive of delivery
 
Thanks all, That's a bit sneaky, if it's £29.95 delivered and they slap on a handling charge at the till. I'll change the thread title to "£37 or less" :)
 
Thanks for the link Cyland, I tried that and as you say got the £5.95 handling charge added on.
 
balidey said:
Its far removed from when they first came out and were going well over £100.
I've only ever used mine for an XBMC media streamer. And my Xbox does that anyway so I'm struggling to find something else for mine to do.

I think mine will be destined for a TV in the bedroom. Not got much other use for it anywhere else.

The only other thing I'd love to do but don't think I have the knowledge is to try and get a couple of pis working as a sonos type system, so one will play music controlled by an Android device to an IP address that the rest can stream from around the house
 
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Shall I change it again to "from £30 delivered" ? :)
 
I think mine will be destined for a TV in the bedroom. Not got much other use for it anywhere else.

The only other thing I'd love to do but don't think I have the knowledge is to try and get a couple of pis working as a sonos type system, so one will play music controlled by an Android device to an IP address that the rest can stream from around the house

Sonos 'type' system might use Squeezebox software.
Try here for progress to date.
Raspberry Pi

A cursory glance seems to indicate its still early days for this set up, but they are getting there. I see 2 applications, one as a lightweight music server (running Logitech Media Server AKA Squeezeserver software) , the second as a client player (running Squeezeplay, Softsqueeze, Squeezeslave and other similar player type software- I can't remember the difference at the moment), perhaps in some cases both combined.

A lot of the Squeezebox stuff is open source, and its been ported to all sorts of low powered hardware in the past, so I'm optimistic your goal is achievable.
Pi seems ideal for this.:)
 
Thanks for that, I was struggling with Squeezebox but seem to be getting my head around it now. Seeing as all my media is on my HP micro server anyway I've installed the server on there and have discovered squeezeplug that I will try on the pi so it can run simple and headless with some speakers. Also found squeeze player for android so will test run with some old phones as soon as I can. If all goes well could get this working for the cost of a few sets of speakers.

If it works might ask Santa for a Squeezebox radio as well to replace my old clock radio in the bedroom
 
I don't use XBMC for anything other than movie/tv rips, but I came across this recently.
Add-on:XSqueeze - XBMC

So, if you are running Squeezebox server software on your Microserver, all you need to do is get XBMC working on a Pi and add this in to make it an audio streamer with a decent interface, AFAICT.

I guess you could run it headless and control via a smartphone app.
I use Ipeng on my apple devices and love it for what its worth.
 
I used to use a Pi as an Airplay receiver as it's built in to the latest XBMC build. I have Itunes installed on my media server and use the Remote app on my apple devices and the same on my Android phone when I had that so all music can be controlled from any device and sent to any Pi or Airport Express etc. If I want to play different music to multiple devices, I also have Audiogalaxy installed on my server and the app installed on all devices so I can stream music straight to them instead.

Cheers
Steve
 

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