Roger Thornton says:27 minutes ago

Hello everyone, it's great to be here and I am looking forward to talking to you all.

altometer says:26 minutes ago

:<

altometer says:26 minutes ago

Hi Roger, thanks for coming!

mediocreengineer says:26 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton This is the first event I've attended. Please ensure you give the question before you answer it, so we all get the context.

h3liosphan says:26 minutes ago

hi roger!

steverobillard says:26 minutes ago

welcome roger

Arsenijs says:25 minutes ago

Also, there's a "message" button in the top right corner of this messagebox, it kind of makes the mesages easier to keep track of.

Nick Sayer says:25 minutes ago

Hi, Roger. My project is SPI driven, so this will be a first for me on R-PI (done it a lot with bare AVR).

Roger Thornton says:25 minutes ago

@mediocreengineer It's my first time here too so will be sure to answer as everyone wants!

Arsenijs says:25 minutes ago

Like, it's a "message" icon, right under the "Add a Project" in the top bar.

Nick Sayer says:25 minutes ago

(don't really have a question, just thought I'd open with SPI discussion)

Sophi says:24 minutes ago

What new features are you considering for the next iteration of the Raspberry Pi? How do you make it so cheap?? (from @Edje13)

Roger Thornton says:24 minutes ago

OK , well the 40 pin header gives you access to an SPI port so you can add any SPI device you want, alot of common IC's have drivers already

Nick Sayer says:23 minutes ago

I didn't think to check to see if there was a driver for my chip already. I was planning on using /dev/spi.* and... the ioctl interface?

Arsenijs says:23 minutes ago

Especially the Linux kernel drivers, they're pretty good. For example, with MCP23017, you can use a kernel driver for it, and it'll actually make the MCP GPIOs available like Linux GPIOs, you could use them like you'd typically use Raspberry Pi GPIOs - so you don't need to bother with I2C stuff at all, just load a driver.

Nick Sayer says:22 minutes ago

A quick google doesn't show anything helpful for the MAX6951 in terms of kernel drivers. But I have mucho experience with talking to this chip from AVR, so I don't mind "byte banging" it in user space.

Roger Thornton says:21 minutes ago

@Edje13 That's a great question, we have constant conundrum of trying to work with what are great features and what the whole user base benefit from. We are also tied to the Processor we use and the interfaces it has. Pi is cheap beacuse we spend an awful lot of time trying to remove excess components, looking for new suppliers and understanding where costs are based on a board.

Neil Cherry says:21 minutes ago

but byte banging in Linux can't be time dependent

Evan Juras says:21 minutes ago

Thanks Roger! Are you looking at new processors at all?

Brandon Aaskov says:21 minutes ago

I have an "am I taking crazy pills" kind of question: I can never see the raspberry pi as a bluetooth device from my iphone. I can request to pair to the iphone from the pi, and that works. I can see the pi in any other device (namely computers), but not iOS. Am I missing something here? Is there something about an Apple device that's making this so illusive? Happy to do the ground work but I want to make sure it's possible before I pull my hair out (what's left of it).

Nick Sayer says:20 minutes ago

@Neil Cherry Well, I'm referring to using the SPI interface to perform individual transactions... Not bit banging, meaning I'd be clocking the individual bits out on GPIO lines by hand.

Nick Sayer says:19 minutes ago

@Neil Cherry And actually, bit-banging the 6951 works reasonably well - it isn't sensitive to timing. But user-space bit banging on R-Pi would be slower than I'd like.

Arsenijs says:19 minutes ago

MAX6951: Oh, that must be because it's not anything Linux typically uses - with RTC, GPIO, PWM etc, it makes sense to write a kernel driver because there's a subsystem in Linux to make work with this easier, and I think there isn't a 7-segment display subsystem in Linux =)

bengt bäverman says:19 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton What features have you contemplated, but rejected due to them driving cost?

Nick Sayer says:19 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov You've made the Pi "discoverable," right?

Arsenijs says:19 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov Are you using BT LE or just 4.0?

Lutetium says:19 minutes ago

Next question is from @Paul Smith, and tags onto the one just asked: When developing a device like the Raspberry Pi, where do you start? Does it begin with "this is a good/interesting processor, let's build a product around it", or "we want to do this, what hardware do we want"?

Roger Thornton says:19 minutes ago

@Evan Juras We have a great relationship with Broadcom who have fostered the idea from the outset and we see that relationship going on for a long time

ronald.sutherland says:18 minutes ago

@Roger How does the WiFi interface with the processor, I guess I'm wondering if an SPI on the GPIO header was lost.

Brandon Aaskov says:18 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer I have made it discoverable. @Arsenijs, this is my current hunch. As far as I know it's just 4.0 and the iPhone has requirements for BLE. That said, I'm not sure how to opt for one or the other on the pi side.

Evan Juras says:16 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton Makes sense! I'm sure it helps that you used to work there too. Seems like the BCMs work great for the Pi. thanks for answering!

h3liosphan says:16 minutes ago

Hi Roger, just throwing a question out there for you - can you say anything about that innovative antenna design on the Zero W, licensed from somewhere. Thanks

altometer says:16 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton on that note, does the wifi have the same issue where it shares the bus with USB?

Roger Thornton says:16 minutes ago

@bengt bäverman There are lots of exciting things that sadly don't make sense for the main board, market specific things like a second Ethernet port or long range low speed radios, that's why we added the 40 Pin header so people could add stuff they needed for a particular task. There are some amazing HAT boards out there.

Arsenijs says:16 minutes ago

@ronald.sutherland AFAIK it's SDIO, it's an interface that SD cards use. BT is connected through one of the UARTs.

Arsenijs says:15 minutes ago

So it neither has the USB contention issue, nor takes SPI or GPIO from the 40-pin header,

Roger Thornton says:15 minutes ago

@ronald.sutherland Wi-FI connects over SDIO and the BlueTooth over UART

erik pax says:15 minutes ago

is there a solderpad or pin to connect an fm antenne to the wifi/bt/fm chip?

Arsenijs says:15 minutes ago

erik - no, they couldn't route it out, at least that was the answer for the Pi3.

spencer says:15 minutes ago

Can the Bluetooth be disconnected to free up the UART?

Nick Sayer says:14 minutes ago

@Arsenijs Have you confirmed that with a real zero W, or are you speaking of the B 3?

Roger Thornton says:14 minutes ago

@h3liosphan We licensed the antenna from a company called Proant, the antenna is basically just a ground plane cut out with some tuning capacitors. They are a great team of engineers in Sweeden

Roger Thornton says:13 minutes ago

@erik pax due to the tight nature of the PCB layout the pad isn't broken out.

Arsenijs says:13 minutes ago

It's on a BGA ball of that Broadcom radio, and I don't think the ball position changed. Nick Sayer - is that what you're asking about?

Nick Sayer says:13 minutes ago

@Arsenijs One of the questions I'm waiting to answer is whether you have to play overlay games on the zero W to bring out BT and serial console at the same time.

h3liosphan says:13 minutes ago

cool, thanks. I already have two zero W boards. Easier in the uk! They work great

Brandon Aaskov says:12 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer good question

Arsenijs says:12 minutes ago

Probably, if the clock speed changes dynamically. I'll check when I get my Zeros.

Brandon Aaskov says:12 minutes ago

Also, thanks for doing this @Roger Thornton!

Nick Sayer says:12 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov I got it working on my B 3, but I had to use "turbo_force" to make it reliable.

Arsenijs says:12 minutes ago

enable_uart=1 in config.txt should work.

Roger Thornton says:12 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer The UARTs are wired the same as Pi3

Roger Thornton says:11 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov happy to help!"

Nick Sayer says:11 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton Ok, so you use the same overlay magic to get serial and BT at the same time? Thanks for confirmation. :)

Arsenijs says:11 minutes ago

You can disable BT UART, yes. I'm not sure if it's remappable to the previous pins, though.

Victor says:11 minutes ago

The amazing cost of the pi makes it available to those of us on a limited budget, but are there any plans for a higher end board with all the bells and whistles cut from the flagship pi?

sfrias1 says:11 minutes ago

Hi, just arrived late. My apologies :-D

Roger Thornton says:10 minutes ago

@Victor isn't that the Pi3?

davedarko says:10 minutes ago

+1

Roger Thornton says:9 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer Yes it is the same as the Pi3, it's a peculiarity of the processor we use

Lutetium says:9 minutes ago

Question from @altometer: Are there any compatibility issues with existing Rpi zero Shields?

Roger Thornton says:9 minutes ago

@altometer

Roger Thornton says:9 minutes ago

@altometer No, it is the same 40 Pin GPIO header that is used on all the recent Pi products with the same set of GPIO wired to it

altometer says:8 minutes ago

sweet

Arsenijs says:8 minutes ago

So, only problems could be with 1) UPS and PSU shields (higher consumption of WiFi/BT?), shields using UART to communicate, and, well WiFi shields are not needed anymore =)

Victor says:7 minutes ago

@Roger Thorton Touché. Haha

Lutetium says:7 minutes ago

next is a question from @spencer: Will there be any kind of assurance that the original Pi Zero will still be produced, or will it be dropped in favour of the Pi Zero W (Meaning my product won't work any more - stupid stupid UART thing)

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

I think that's a *huge* draw for embedding the Pi - the fact that the GPIO is consistent across the whole line like that.

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

Even the first 24 being consistent with the really old models.

Arsenijs says:7 minutes ago

*26

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

What @Arsenijs said

Lutetium says:6 minutes ago

and a question from @Radomir Dopieralski: Why the ancient ARM core?

steverobillard says:6 minutes ago

@spencer I asked this on the forums yesterday and they will keep making the original zero in fact they added an assembly line to make the zer oW and help with inventory.

Brandon Aaskov says:12 minutes ago

Also, thanks for doing this @Roger Thornton!

Nick Sayer says:12 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov I got it working on my B 3, but I had to use "turbo_force" to make it reliable.

Arsenijs says:12 minutes ago

enable_uart=1 in config.txt should work.

Roger Thornton says:11 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer The UARTs are wired the same as Pi3

Roger Thornton says:11 minutes ago

@Brandon Aaskov happy to help!"

Nick Sayer says:11 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton Ok, so you use the same overlay magic to get serial and BT at the same time? Thanks for confirmation. :)

Arsenijs says:11 minutes ago

You can disable BT UART, yes. I'm not sure if it's remappable to the previous pins, though.

Victor says:10 minutes ago

The amazing cost of the pi makes it available to those of us on a limited budget, but are there any plans for a higher end board with all the bells and whistles cut from the flagship pi?

sfrias1 says:10 minutes ago

Hi, just arrived late. My apologies :-D

Roger Thornton says:10 minutes ago

@Victor isn't that the Pi3?

davedarko says:10 minutes ago

+1

Roger Thornton says:9 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer Yes it is the same as the Pi3, it's a peculiarity of the processor we use

Lutetium says:9 minutes ago

Question from @altometer: Are there any compatibility issues with existing Rpi zero Shields?

Roger Thornton says:9 minutes ago

@altometer

Roger Thornton says:8 minutes ago

@altometer No, it is the same 40 Pin GPIO header that is used on all the recent Pi products with the same set of GPIO wired to it

altometer says:8 minutes ago

sweet

Arsenijs says:7 minutes ago

So, only problems could be with 1) UPS and PSU shields (higher consumption of WiFi/BT?), shields using UART to communicate, and, well WiFi shields are not needed anymore =)

Victor says:7 minutes ago

@Roger Thorton Touché. Haha

Lutetium says:7 minutes ago

next is a question from @spencer: Will there be any kind of assurance that the original Pi Zero will still be produced, or will it be dropped in favour of the Pi Zero W (Meaning my product won't work any more - stupid stupid UART thing)

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

I think that's a *huge* draw for embedding the Pi - the fact that the GPIO is consistent across the whole line like that.

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

Even the first 24 being consistent with the really old models.

Arsenijs says:7 minutes ago

*26

Nick Sayer says:7 minutes ago

What @Arsenijs said

Lutetium says:6 minutes ago

and a question from @Radomir Dopieralski: Why the ancient ARM core?

steverobillard says:6 minutes ago

@spencer I asked this on the forums yesterday and they will keep making the original zero in fact they added an assembly line to make the zer oW and help with inventory.

Roger Thornton says:5 minutes ago

@Spencer We are still planning to produce the original Zero but we think the Zero W is alot more exciting and reduces the additional parts needed.

Nick Sayer says:5 minutes ago

Once upon a time, I considered wiring a Pi up with a coin acceptor to revive from my youth the old biorhythm machines that used to be in the arcades. It's whacky psuedoscience, yes, but profitable. :)

Arsenijs says:5 minutes ago

I'll add my question from the spreadsheet - "Why does Pi Zero consume so much current - around 80-100mA from 5V, more from Li-Ion? What can be done to decrease the power consumption, apart from the usual ["disable HDMI", "disable green LED"]?"

erik pax says:5 minutes ago

is the bootrom still the same in W as pi1 or has it been updated like the pi3?

spencer says:4 minutes ago

@steverobillard I kind of hope people buy lots of the W to releive supply problems with the Zero - but hope enough people still buy the Zero that they don't drop it :-/

Nick Sayer says:4 minutes ago

100 mA doesn't seem like a lot to me for what you get...

steverobillard says:4 minutes ago

@spencer https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/ten-freakin-bucks-zero-w-aftermath/#comment-1272741

Brandon Aaskov says:4 minutes ago

That's about what the Model A+ consumed I think

spencer says:4 minutes ago

Thatnks @Roger Thornton :-)

Arsenijs says:4 minutes ago

It's a lot when you're building a mobile phone, even more when you're looking on how to make it actually work well.

Nick Sayer says:3 minutes ago

Really? I must be misremembering. I had it at ~200, but I could be wrong.

Arsenijs says:3 minutes ago

Wasn't the BCM2835 originally a mobile phone chipset?

h3liosphan says:3 minutes ago

except for this UaRT issue I'm only just hearing about, why would you need the original zero? Can the issue not be worked around?

Roger Thornton says:3 minutes ago

@Radomir Dopieralski The ARM core is really rather old yes, only 2835 (the original chip used) is a POP package (memory soldered on top of the processor) which makes it ideal for small spaces, Zero W. If you look at Pi2 or Pi3 you can see the space and routing that processor + discrete memory take up, it simply wouldn't fit. Zero W is a fantastically powerful board but it's never meant to replace the Pi3.

spencer says:3 minutes ago

The origina Zero is half the price :-)

Brandon Aaskov says:3 minutes ago

@Arsenijs I agree. The project I'm looking at needs to draw as little power as possible so being able to get some low-hanging fruit, like disabling LEDs, would be great.

Nick Sayer says:2 minutes ago

And what UART issue? If it's the BT thing, that does have a workaround in config.txt.

steverobillard says:2 minutes ago

@spencer I hope they do too . I donated the Pi Zero's needed for the python/physical computing course we are running at the library and becasue of the one pi per order restrictions paid more in shipping than the pi's cost

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@erik pax same as Zero

Roger Thornton says:a minute ago

@spencer

spencer says:a minute ago

@Nick Sayer Only a work around if you use Linux. Doesn't work on bare-metal programming ;-)

Radomir Dopieralski says:a minute ago

@Roger Thornton thank you!

Nick Sayer says:a minute ago

@Scallamerican

Roger Thornton says:a minute ago

@Spencer we made it a policy never to stop producing a board, you can still buy the original Pi.

Nick Sayer says:a minute ago

@Spencer ah.

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@Arsenijs Power consumption is mainly from the Wifi chip, we leave it on permanently as we assume a mains supply. In your phone there is a lot of work spent turning off un-needed things to keep consumption down

h3liosphan says:a minute ago

ok million quid question - when are we going to see the Pi 4!?

Arsenijs says:a minute ago

I'm talking about the WiFi-less Pi Zero.

Nick Sayer says:a minute ago

I think the next should be the Pi 3.1, then the Pi 3.14, then the Pi 3.141.....

Arsenijs says:a minute ago

I've now designed and ordered some power monitoring boards that I'll use to make a power monitoring test jig. I aim to get the most out of a Zero with software tweaks, playing with clock speeds, kernel parameters etc. However, it's all of no use when a Pi Zero consumes 50mA even when the SD card is not plugged in.

Greg Bushta says:a few seconds ago

@Nick Sayer :-D

Greg Bushta says:3 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer :-D

Roger Thornton says:3 minutes ago

@Arsenijs Yes BCM2835 was a mobile phone chip that we all worked on many years ago (a shockingly long time ago now). We were orignially working on Multimedia Co-Processor chips, something that would have hardware acceleration for intesive tasks like Video decode, ISP or 3D and then with 2835 we added in a very small ARM as a proof of concept

Edgar says:2 minutes ago

will there be a version of the pi with 1 gig ethernet?

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer I really like the numbering scheme idea!

davedarko says:2 minutes ago

at least make a special 3.141 version :)

h3liosphan says:2 minutes ago

Niiiiice!

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@h3liosphan There will be one but I can't say when

/dev/null says:a minute ago

Are there any plans to include USB 3 on the Pi 4? Would make my day if that ever happens :)

Nick Sayer says:a minute ago

@Roger Thornton if I had a feature request, it'd be USB over pins. That is, USB for hats.

Lutetium says:a minute ago

Question from @M.daSilva How did you manage to boost the Rpizero to 1GHz, considering the original BCM2835 could run at 700MHz, and would be unstable if overclocked at 1gig?

Arsenijs says:a minute ago

So, yeah, my question still is unanswered. Just what consumes so much, compared to a regular phone?

davedarko says:a minute ago

+1 for usb hats

steverobillard says:a minute ago

@davedarko +1 version 3.14

Neil Cherry says:a minute ago

My USB hub sits on my Pi Zero

Neil Cherry says:a minute ago

pogo pins

davedarko says:a minute ago

something for D+ and D- like there is for run and tv

Nick Sayer says:a few seconds ago

There have been more than a couple things I've decided not to do because adding a usb device connector and a 4 inch cable was just *lame*

Roger Thornton says:a few seconds ago

@/dev/null I think it would be an exciting addition; What do you need USB3 for ?

Nick Sayer says:a few seconds ago

(to a hat)

MobileWill says:a few seconds ago

Pi with Type-c ;)

xemexe says:a few seconds ago

I luv Pi

Arsenijs says:2 minutes ago

A cutout&testpoints on the pHAT + wires to two testpoints on the Zero =) Also, there are testpoints for USB D-/D+ on the Pi 2 and 3, right under the USB sockets.

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer that's a really interesting idea and would open up a lot of additions to the HAT what would you have on a HAT that connected to USB?

Nick Sayer says:2 minutes ago

@MobileWill WAY too complicated / expensive

Arsenijs says:2 minutes ago

Yeah, and pretty much useless.

davedarko says:a minute ago

Not that it'll get overlooked: Question from @M.daSilva How did you manage to boost the Rpizero to 1GHz, considering the original BCM2835 could run at 700MHz, and would be unstable if overclocked at 1gig?

Nick Sayer says:a minute ago

@Roger Thornton My first idea was a Pi PoE hat. It would have the Ethernet interface right there on the hat so you wouldn't have to loop an output cable over.

Arsenijs says:a minute ago

However, a "Type-C RPi HAT" would be an interesting idea for a Kickstarter campaign, that'd be useless but have all the buzzwords to part fools with their money (and around 10 people that could actually make use of it).

Roger Thornton says:a few seconds ago

@Arsenijs Wii-Fi and Bluetooth are very heavy consumers of power if you don't turn them on and off in a clever way, Radios are very power hungry.

MobileWill says:a few seconds ago

@Nick Sayer True but its getting better. I have started working with type-c

MobileWill says:2 minutes ago

Type-c could allow for some interesting project using 1 connector for everything

/dev/null says:2 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton Would like USB3 to make use of Gb Ethernet adapters. Right now, I'm using a Pi as my router after I got tired of putting up with the instability of me wireless router.

Arsenijs says:a minute ago

@Roger Thornton I understand that, but I'm talking about the Pi Zero that doesn't even have WiFi and BT. Essentially, the consumption comes either from the BCM, or from the SD card.

h3liosphan says:a minute ago

Thanks Roger, also, how about building in a SATA interface over high speed interconnect, wipe out the NAS box market overnight!?

Nick Sayer says:a few seconds ago

@MobileWill - I started going down the road of designing a car -> USB C power socket. I mean, yes, you can get them from Amazon, but I wanted to see what was possible.

Roger Thornton says:a few seconds ago

@MobileWill @Nick Sayer USB-C negotiation isn't very compliacted it is just reading a resitor value for the simple negotiations, all you need is a cheap ADC.

Neil Cherry says:a few seconds ago

@Roger Thornton, usb3 == faster access to root (mount sdx on an ssd)

/dev/null says:5 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton Would like USB3 to make use of Gb Ethernet adapters. Right now, I'm using a Pi as my router after I got tired of putting up with the instability of me wireless router.

Arsenijs says:4 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton I understand that, but I'm talking about the Pi Zero that doesn't even have WiFi and BT. Essentially, the consumption comes either from the BCM, or from the SD card.

h3liosphan says:4 minutes ago

Thanks Roger, also, how about building in a SATA interface over high speed interconnect, wipe out the NAS box market overnight!?

Nick Sayer says:4 minutes ago

@MobileWill - I started going down the road of designing a car -> USB C power socket. I mean, yes, you can get them from Amazon, but I wanted to see what was possible.

Roger Thornton says:4 minutes ago

@MobileWill @Nick Sayer USB-C negotiation isn't very compliacted it is just reading a resitor value for the simple negotiations, all you need is a cheap ADC.

Neil Cherry says:4 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton, usb3 == faster access to root (mount sdx on an ssd)

Neil Cherry says:3 minutes ago

Sorry, I'm on several chats, trying to pay attention

MobileWill says:3 minutes ago

@Nick Sayer my problem has. been the cc lines, my design isn't working for reverasbility. but thats another topic

erik pax says:3 minutes ago

USBC with HDMI Alt.Mode to replace miniHDMI

Arsenijs says:3 minutes ago

Lol, nobody's wiping the NAS market out. USB3 and SATA would either need to be over USB, or need to move to another Broadcom chip.

Stefan-Xp says:3 minutes ago

@Roger Thornton: How is the general mood on Windows 10 IOT? Do alot people use it? To me it seems most people are using linux

Arsenijs says:2 minutes ago

@Stefan-Xp https://nicola.blog/2016/08/03/raspberry-pi-why-i-chose-not-use-windows-iot/

Roger Thornton says:2 minutes ago

@Arsenijs I am not sure if I follow what is the issue with Zero's power consumption that you are seeing?

Arsenijs says:2 minutes ago

Well, let me just plug one in...

Roger Thornton says:a few seconds ago

@erik pax I saw HDMI over USB-C at CES and think it is a great idea. Essentially all you need is a a way to get the CEC and other contorl signals over the diff pairs. I think it's a really neat soloution.

Arsenijs says:a few seconds ago

tl;dr it drains battery a lot faster than mobile phones do, and it's a mobile phone chipset-based thing. Where's the consumption, nd how can I decrease it/can I even?

MobileWill says:a minute ago

Will there be a low cost compute module, like a pi zero version?

Brandon Aaskov says:a minute ago

@Roger Thornton, if someone has made a prototype with any of the pi devices, and wants to create a new board with only the required features, is this something the Pi Foundation does or would this need to happen through a third party?

Nick Sayer says:a few seconds ago

Can you instead perhaps under clock the CM?