Raspberry Pi - $35 Linux computer

  • Thread starter Thread starter daz
  • Start date Start date
There were no instructions supplied but I expected that and followed the instructions linked from the product page. It connects via header to the Pi Zero.

u9zIjSq.jpeg


Dead easy to put together, took me half an hour or so. Note that I supplied the two long bolts that are closest to the camera, it came with short ones but I found that I didn't like the Pi flapping around.
 
Feek said:
There were no instructions supplied but I expected that and followed the instructions linked from the product page. It connects via header to the Pi Zero.

u9zIjSq.jpeg


Dead easy to put together, took me half an hour or so. Note that I supplied the two long bolts that are closest to the camera, it came with short ones but I found that I didn't like the Pi flapping around.
Click to expand...

I see thanks. Looks fairly straight forward even for the likes of me! I'll be getting their phono adapter and my idea is dac -> phono -> amp which leaves the line out stereo jack free for...something?!
 
My pHAT DAC arrived in post today. Had to buy elsewhere as pimoroni were out of stock. Got the Zero W, case, Mono adapter and PSU hopefully arriving tomorrow.
 
I/m thinking about getting a raspberry pi but I would like to know what i could do with it, just the main kit I don't want to spend on extras at this point.

i dont want to be one of those people that will buy it as a fad.

a few things ive heard of pi hole, open vpn, download hub
 
With Pi-Hole you'd be better of with a with a Pi 2 or 3 which has built-in ethernet as you wouldn't really want to rely on wifi for handling DNS. Kodi/Plex is an option and likes of LibreELEC means Kodi is the OS so boots straight into it. Emulator is another popular option and don't think extras are needed (excluding keyboard/controller)
 
Hey guys, is there a way to backup the SD card of a live running system?

IE, run a script that will back it up into an image file on a NAS share.
 
I've recently changed my ISP and they warned me that my connection might drop out a few times over the first couple of weeks. My Netgear sometimes doesn't seem to like recovering (although I've upgraded the firmware and that's supposed to help) so I've been playing around building a watchdog timer out of a Zero W and an external relay.

It pings the internet and if it doesn't get a response within a set time, it drops the power to the router for ten seconds to force a reboot. Or at least that's what'll it do once I've got it all built into a box, it's still at the testing stage right now and is looking good. I've also got an LED flashing each time it does a successful ping.
 
Well it's done, Pi Zero W with a relay.

GgU4Ots.jpeg


The power to the router goes through the relay, I just broke into the power cable.

It boots and checks the internet connection every ten seconds, if all is good, the green LED flashes briefly. If it fails to get a response within two minutes, it triggers the relay for ten seconds which drops power to the router. It then sleeps for four minutes to allow the router to restart and reconnect to the internet and then starts checking again.

The relay isn't energised normally, the connection the router goes through is normally closed so I can restart the Pi without causing the router to drop out.

I'm very happy with this. This is the first time I've done anything with the GPIO and although I found some simple Python code to check the internet, I've tweaked the whole thing to work as I want, including the LED flash each time the check is successful.

I did have a problem where the relay would trigger on reboot and it took me a while to work out what was actually happening. The Pi was booting and starting my Python routine before the WiFi had a chance to connect and so it was seeing what it thought was an internet drop and going into the reboot routine. A simple sleep command in the appropriate crontab entry to just wait fifteen seconds before starting was a nice straightforward fix.

In my mind, this is what the Pi is all about, thinking of something it can do and then finding a way to do it. This only occurred to me on Wednesday afternoon and now, three days later, I've done it!
 
So this is probably a stupid question but if I get the latest Raspberry Pi Model B can I use it to run Kodi and stream TV on it? I don't need to store any media files on it. All I want to do is watch TV from it on an HDTV. If it is possible would the experience be OK? I mean I want smooth operation and reasonable speed for actions. I'm just thinking that for the price of a Raspberry Pi it might be worth the money if I can watch multiple TV channels and Netflix and Amazon Video and stuff in my bedroom.

Edit: Actually after watching some YouTube tutorials I might just get an Amazon Fire TV stick instead. It looks like it can also run Kodi but should be easier to set up and use. The new one due out in April is only £40 so that seems like the best option to me.
 
Last edited:
Has anyone tried OwnCloud (https://owncloud.org)?


My iPhone backup stopped a few months ago and I don’t really want to pay apple just so they can back up my photos. I’ve installed OwnCloud this afternoon (Over SSH & some VPN use I’ll add :D) and it looks like it’s the answer I’ve been looking for. Highly customisable as well and lots of settings to tinker with. Worth a look!
 
muttclugg said:
Has anyone tried OwnCloud (https://owncloud.org)?
Click to expand...
I'm using NextCloud from the guide here and it's working really well. I've got an external 500Gb laptop drive in a cradle fixed with blu-tac under a Pi3. It just sits against the wall at the back of my desk, working well. How are you backing up photos from your iPhone to the OwnCloud? That sounds like a good thing to see if I can do with the NextCloud.
eDIDfV9.jpeg


Begbie said:
Is the Pi Zero good enough for a DNS and PiHole?
Click to expand...
Technically yes. However two things. 1) Performance over WiFi won't be fantastic so if you're going to do this, get a Zero rather than a Zero W and plug an ethernet adapter in. 2) The web interface will be dreadfully slow to query the daily stats. It will actually work perfectly well as an ad blocker but don't expect to be able to use the stats. This is being addressed in a future version of Pi-Hole though.
 
Thanks Feek.

I'm now thinking about running a VPN + PiHole on it. Is this possible, looking at your speed results before I'm tempted with a Pi3.

I don't live in the UK, so a VPN comes in handy. A permanent VPN at router level, assuming this is what the Pi can do, would be incredible.
 
Begbie said:
Thanks Feek.

I'm now thinking about running a VPN + PiHole on it. Is this possible, looking at your speed results before I'm tempted with a Pi3.

I don't live in the UK, so a VPN comes in handy. A permanent VPN at router level, assuming this is what the Pi can do, would be incredible.
Click to expand...

Yes you can easily run a vpn and pi hole on a pi3. That's what I've had mine doing (although I've disabled pi hole for now whilst I figure out how to work it with ownCloud).

Have a look for pivpn. Very easy to set up.
 
Installed RuneAudio on my Pi2 last night, really impressed with the simplicity of using it and the remote controll UI from either a browser or an Android app. I'm wanting to now scale things up a bit...

Is a plug in DAC with RCA phono out really worth it? I've seen some comments saying they'll transform the quality but so far I've not really had any issues with the 3.5mm jack? Granted I've only really streamed music from online and through some older speakers right now rather than listening to decent MP3 rips / lossless audio on a better hifi...

Maybe my hearing isn't good enough, maybe I just don't know what I'm missing?!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom