Apr 252016
 
New 8 Megapixel Raspberry Pi camera 2.1 launches

The new 8 Megapixel Raspberry Pi camera is released today. It’s fully backward compatible with all camera-enabled Raspberry Pis produced to-date. It uses a SONY IMX219 sensor capable of 3280 x 2464 pixel stills. It’s mechanically almost identical to the previous camera model (V1.3) except for rounded corners on the PCB – and there’s no red LED on the front. There’s also a NOIR version being released at the same time. They both support 1080p30, 720p60 and 640x480p90 video. Here’s a video overview… Specifications Lens: Fixed focus Megapixels: 8 megapixel native resolution sensor Camera Resolution: […more…]

Mar 042016
 
Raspberry Pi Family Photo updated to include Pi3B 29 Feb 2016

It’s become a bit of a new model launch tradition now that I release a new “Pi family photo” with all the main revisions of Raspberry Pi in it. I’ve done things a little differently from last time in order to get a better resolution result. As usual I make this 1500px version available to the world under a CC-BY-SA-4 licence with the only condition being that the RasPi.TV credit stays intact. Aside from that, it may be used as you wish. I have ‘gone to town’ on this one slightly. Where previously I’d always […more…]

Mar 032016
 
How Much Power Does Raspberry Pi3B Use? How Fast Is It Compared To Pi2B?

The Raspberry Pi 3, launched this week, is more powerful than the Pi2. It also requires a bit more electrical power if you’re going to be hammering those four A53 CPU cores. How much more? The recommended PSU is 5.1V, 2.5A, which is 0.5A higher than for previous Pis. That doesn’t mean the Pi itself needs that much, but with four USB ports onboard, the PSU has to cater for power-hungry USB devices as well. I usually publish some power measurements each time a new Pi is released. But this time I learnt something new […more…]

 Posted by at 11:23 am
Feb 292016
 
Raspberry Pi 3 model B launches today - 64-bit quad A53 1.2 GHz BCM2837

Raspberry Pi 3 model B launch is today’s big news. The new Pi sports a 64-bit quad-core ARM Cortex A53 CPU with VideoCore IV GPU packaged into the new BCM2837 chip. This 1.2GHz CPU offers ~50% speed improvement over the Pi 2’s BCM2836. Video Overview Pretty much all the information and impressions I have of the Raspberry Pi 3 model B are in this short video… …but if you prefer to read, it’s all here too… Now With Built-in WiFi & Bluetooth The other major news is that the Raspberry Pi 3B now has built-in […more…]

Jan 072016
 
Always Test Everything - Twitter App Update

I’m a firm believer that you should always test things in advance. It helps avoid unexpected last-minute panics when things don’t work as you expected them to. On Friday I’m going to pick a winner from my twitter followers using the twitter app script I wrote back in October 2013. My Joey from @gooligumelec just arrived. :) I have a spare I will give to a randomly selected follower on Friday. pic.twitter.com/yGtwATYXng — RasPi.TV (@RasPiTV) January 5, 2016 It Still Works, But… Since I had no idea where the SD card with that old Raspbian […more…]

Nov 302015
 
Raspberry Pi Zero - Updated Pi Family Photo

With each new release of Raspberry Pi, I usually do a new family photo. It’s getting harder and harder to fit them all ‘on the sofa’ and get them all smiling. The way I’ve always done it is “all in one shot”. I may change this for future versions in order to get more definition. We’ll see. (As usual, more ideas than implementation time.) I am very happy for people to use this photo if they wish to do so provided the RasPi.TV credit stays intact. I make it available at 1500px resolution as CC-BY-SA. […more…]

Nov 272015
 
Raspberry Pi Zero - Power Measurements

Since the Pi Zero is small and eminently wearable, I thought I’d take some power measurements as this will be useful information for people to plan their projects. So I ran my usual series of tests and updated the table and chart showing all consumer models of Raspberry Pi. In my standard tests, I measure the current consumption, using the calibrated shunt on my Emeter, while the Pi is: Idling; Loading LXDE; Watching HD video and Shooting HD video. Since the Zero has no camera port, shooting video is not applicable, but all the other […more…]

Oct 152015
 
GPIO Zero Test Drive - Making Light of Security

Giving GPIO Zero (Beta version) a test drive might make you feel a little insecure, but I’m aiming to throw some light on the situation. I decided to try out some of the built-in features of GPIO Zero by working up a little hardware project. I looked at the current feature set and decided to try and combine MotionSensor, LED and LightSensor all at once. What sort of project uses that kind of technology? Why a PIR-controlled security light of course – if you swap the LED for a relay and 12V lamp! The video […more…]

Oct 122015
 
GPIO Zero - Introduction

If you’re a RasPi.TV regular, you’ll know that one of my very favourite things is hacking around with the GPIO ports on the Raspberry Pi and sharing my findings with the world. Sometimes this involves documenting a new feature, sometimes it involves making a new project, using a new chip or just getting something working that I haven’t tried before. But it nearly always involves Python programming and the brilliant RPi.GPIO Python library by Ben Croston. I’ve written all sorts of tutorials (~16) on RPi.GPIO because it is one of my favourite things. You may […more…]

Sep 082015
 
New Official Raspberry Pi DSI screen launches

The official 7 inch DSI Raspberry Pi screen is now launched and available for purchase. It’s been a long time in the making, but the B+, the A+ and Pi2B have all been responsible for pushing this display to the back-burner. When there finally was some ‘engineering time’ to get on with it, hurdles were faced with EMC compliance and chip availability. But those hurdles are now overcome and the screen is now launched. And it looks great (click any photo for higher resolution). Video Overview Here’s a video overview. There’s more detail in the […more…]