[HN Gopher] CutiePi - A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet
___________________________________________________________________
CutiePi - A Raspberry Pi 4 tablet
Author : captn3m0
Score : 324 points
Date : 2021-03-21 13:08 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (cutiepi.io)
(TXT) w3m dump (cutiepi.io)
| remram wrote:
| This seems like a terrible Nexus 7 for twice the price and
| launching a decade later? That you have to charge every 5 hours?
| hwc wrote:
| I miss my nexus 7.
| ekianjo wrote:
| Yeah, but you can bet that 10 years later you won't be running
| obsolete software on it.
| remram wrote:
| What makes you think CutiePi Shell will be maintained that
| long? Android has withstood the test of time, and although
| you'd need a custom mod to update your Nexus 7, chances are
| CutiePi won't live that long.
| mrlonglong wrote:
| They don't seem to have mentioned storage?
| hwc wrote:
| MicroSD, I think. Those can be a TB, if you want to pay for it.
|
| Would be nice to load up on movies copied from DVDs I own for
| the kids to watch on road trips.
| unnouinceput wrote:
| I have this on my list as TODO for my kids. Mine will be with:
|
| - 30k mAh battery, instead of 5k
|
| - use of RPi HQ camera (12 MP, not 5)
|
| - 8 GB RAM (not 2) & a 1 TB NVMe SSD
|
| Projected price for above components is ~ $350. I want to
| introduce them to Linux (they do everything on Windows for now)
| and by exposing the RPi's GPIO to also introduce them to
| robotics.
| skybrian wrote:
| A device like this with a smaller display (but still including
| amplifier, speaker, and battery) might be nice for embedding in a
| music project. Does anyone know of a board like that?
| dxxvi wrote:
| If I buy a tablet with Raspberry Pi inside, I want to use genuine
| Linux (Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch, Alpine ... not Android) with
| different apps (terminal, vs code, python, node, java ...)
| besides the browser. I will type a lot on it. So, I need a bigger
| screen (bigger than the 12.9" ipad pro) and a keyboard and
| touchpad like the ipad magic keyboard. I also like to have 4
| chargeable USB-C ports on 4 sides of the tablet. I think I'm
| dreaming :-)
| worik wrote:
| I love this idea, but I would like something more ambitious. This
| is a interesting addition to the stable of Linux Tablets - with
| the Pine Tab that is one and a half?
|
| Thing is I am desperate to have a tablet with decent capabilities
| (and at about $500 price point) that is _not_ a consumer device,
| and I need it nine months ago. Too late now - up to my eyebrows
| in Apple iPad nonsense.
|
| I have been working on a application that uses a dedicated tablet
| (iPad FFS, why does Apple hate developers so much? I spent thirty
| years away from them - how fantastic they used to be... I
| digress) I would really like to have complete control of the
| tablet that the users are out using - controlling millions and
| millions of dollars of assets and revenue - not have a consumer
| device with all the cruft that implies.
|
| Whilst it is possible to strip capabilities off of a consumer
| device, as a developer I am not in control of it. The only
| confidence I can have in it is based on Apple's engineering, and
| as a developer I have a inside look at that, and it is not what
| it was (or seemed to a younger me thirty years ago).
|
| Nice start, too little, too late - for me.
| axiolite wrote:
| > Thing is I am desperate to have a tablet with decent
| capabilities (and at about $500 price point) that is not a
| consumer device
|
| Reading your rant, I have no idea what your problem or
| requirements actually are. Why not buy $350 Surface Go tablets
| and put together a Linux image that runs on it?
| onesun wrote:
| Is it just me, or does that look like a drywall screw holding the
| handle together?
| 404mm wrote:
| Omg yes!! That cannot be unseen!
| amelius wrote:
| I think the entire thing is a 3d-printed prototype. It
| definitely needs some more love from both product designers and
| mechanical engineers.
| savant_penguin wrote:
| How does it compare with a $200 phone performance wise?
| crazygringo wrote:
| I love this concept, I just _really_ want one with an e-ink
| screen instead.
|
| I think there's a great niche for "embedded" devices around the
| home -- weather readout panels, lighting controls, music player,
| intercom, etc. -- but glowing rectangles mounted to the wall are
| just too... glowing. E-ink panels is where it's at, and a
| Raspberry Pi powering it is perfect.
|
| Unfortunately, the only real general-purpose e-ink tablet I'm
| aware of is the Boox, but their models are all $400-800, which is
| _way_ too expensive (when similar tech in a Kindle is $80).
|
| All I want is a relatively low-power, low-memory, low-storage
| touchscreen e-paper tablet (i.e. specs of an old Kindle) that I
| can run Linux and a WebKit browser on.
|
| And I want them to be cheap enough in bulk so that other
| companies and startups can build home devices _on top_ of them to
| resell.
| t0r0nat0r wrote:
| I got the BOOX Note 3 and it somewhat dooes what I need it to.
| It's mind boggling to me, however, that nobody has tapped into
| this market yet. I think Lenovo even made a laptop which had
| one e-ink as well as a regular display, but used the e-ink
| display in place of the keyboard. That just felt like they were
| rubbing it in tbh.
| tluyben2 wrote:
| I have the note 3 as well and it would be rather perfect for
| many things if it would have a SD card slot.
| jodrellblank wrote:
| > " _I love this concept, I just really want one with an e-ink
| screen instead._ "
|
| How close would a hand-crank mechanism be to driving an e-ink
| tablet for a useful amount of time? A quick look at a clockwork
| crank-wind-up torch shows it has 300mAh battery and 30hrs of
| blinking SOS LED on a full charge, and they claim 1min of
| winding gives it 2hrs of blinking LED, so roughly 20mAh per
| minute of winding. How much computing can one do in 20mAh?
|
| "Clockwork radio" and no-battery crystal radios must be quite
| low power, and one approach for e-ink screens is to only update
| a small changed area of screen at once. The FireBeetle ESP32
| can deep-sleep on 0.011mA [1] and reference is at 39mA. Maybe
| 1min of clowkwork winding could drive it at reference power for
| 30 mins, and half-power for an hour?
|
| What kind of computing UX/UI/OS could there be with primarily
| audio feedback[2] using a low power earphone, e-Ink style
| screen updated only on demand?
|
| I carried on this thought to "treadle powered computer"
| thinking of a flywheel, and found someone has built one:
| https://scoraigwind.co.uk/2010/07/treadle-powered-computer/
| which seems to be generating around 6 Watts and running a
| laptop.
|
| [1] https://diyi0t.com/reduce-the-esp32-power-consumption/
|
| [2] http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/ - EMACSPEAK computing
| interface for the blind. Also ref the classic `ed` editor which
| doesn't print unless you ask, because it was from the days of
| printing on paper
| darknavi wrote:
| Yes! I want a Home Assistant panel in my house but don't want
| to hack together some old Android monstrosity.
| lnsru wrote:
| Your comparison is wrong. Kindle isn't being sold with
| sustainable profit. A hardware company couldn't operate with
| that margin. Plus Kindle has a huge volume. Not really
| comparable with an e-ink tablet what makes latter even more
| expensive.
|
| You can get for that money 7,5" e-paper hat for Raspberry Pi.
| It goes for 71,99EUR on German Amazon.
| kvirani wrote:
| They aren't saying that it needs to be $80. Just not 10x that
| price.
| profsnuggles wrote:
| Well a kindle is actually $110 when it's not ad supported
| and boox is selling a comparable device for $185. So very
| similarly priced.
|
| I would suspect the boox actually has more capable hardware
| because it needs to run android 10. I don't care enough to
| check though.
| mastazi wrote:
| Kindle is not just subsidised by ads, the business model
| is based on the fact that you are going to buy ebooks. I
| wouldn't be surprised if the non-ad Kindle was also being
| produced at a loss, just like to ad-supported one.
|
| You are right that $185 might be a more realistic
| pricing, but that's a 68% increase over the price of the
| $110 Kindle so I wouldn't say that they are similarly
| priced.
| jimktrains2 wrote:
| Remarkable tablets are pretty hackable. They run Linux and let
| you ssh in and install othwr software by default. The screen is
| also a decent size and touch sensitive.
| julianlam wrote:
| The stopgap solution for this is pascalw's kindle-dash[1]. I
| set it up on my jailbroken kindle and now it displays some
| headlines, my google calendar events, and the weather (via
| OpenWeatherMap API)
|
| Last time it was on HN: [2]
|
| [1] https://github.com/pascalw/kindle-dash
|
| [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25939042
| kemonocode wrote:
| I'm sure it has been stated before but I do wonder why e-ink
| displays remain still so out of reach even though the sort of
| parents that were encumbering them have expired? It really does
| seem that anything that involves e-ink panels comes with a huge
| markup.
| ezluckyfree wrote:
| I think that the initial Eink tech wasn't really suited for a
| general purpose computer. There have been recent advancements
| that fixed a lot of the issues, but this technology is still
| new and expensive.
| notRobot wrote:
| Here's your answer:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26143779
| adkadskhj wrote:
| The CLEARink product in that thread looks _amazing_. Super
| excited to see that come to market. I'd buy a dozen of
| those displays for pairings with Pi's around the house.
| SimianLogic2 wrote:
| Seconded. I looked into this at the start of the Pandemic --
| there are a few crap ones on Amazon. I couldn't get them to
| work with my phone. I'd love to just have a set of web
| bookmarks and be able to load those or send it a URL from my
| device or even a page out of Notion.
|
| My main use case: when I'm following a recipe, my devices go to
| sleep in a minute or two and it's a huge pain in the ass to
| wake it up and type in passwords while covered in sauce or
| flour or raw meat or whatever. I've started printing (or
| writing) recipes on blank paper just so I can move them around
| the kitchen and not worry about things going to sleep on me.
|
| The press would eat it up with snark (Silicon Valley invents
| recipe cards. ha ha ha ha ha so clever!), but I don't want a
| rolodex full of cardboard that I have to stick in a drawer
| somewhere and sort/manage.
| gbear605 wrote:
| It seems like the simple solution is just to change your
| phone's sleep settings when you know you're going to be
| cooking
| rektide wrote:
| When do the Pixel Qi / One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) / XO-PC
| screen patents expire? :) Why not both? :)
|
| Update: oh holy shit, John Gilmore was a Pixel Qi investor,
| bought the patents to help the company close cleanly rather
| than go bankrupt, and licenses the patents with an generally-
| available Defensive Patent License[1]! What a story!!! Thanks
| John! Pixel Qi is from ~2010, so he's better than halved the
| time it took to get this amazing technology legally accessible
| to the world. The gotcha is that it's a somewhat "copy-left"
| gnu like license, so anyone unwilling to open some of their own
| patents for use (or not holding patents) is going to have to go
| to John to get these built, until these patents expire.
|
| Just a quick word on the Pixel Qi screen, it's a LCD screen
| with a normal transflective mode, but it can also switch into a
| reflective black and white mode that works great outdoors. 10"
| 1024x600 screens go for a bit over $100 today.
|
| [1] https://goodereader.com/blog/electronic-readers/the-rise-
| and...
| baybal2 wrote:
| It's a big problem to get active matrix monochrome displays
| these days, let alone reflective ones.
| Sunspark wrote:
| Hisense sells a transflective monochrome LCD android
| tablet.
| baybal2 wrote:
| Very likely it's a custom order panel. I would very like
| to see a teardown.
|
| The whites are still quite bad I can see already, it has
| no special high whiteness polariser.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Like the ones used in Chitu Systems SLA resin
| printers(Elegoo, Anycubic, Creality...)?
| baybal2 wrote:
| From first look, they use colour ones.
| throwaway81523 wrote:
| Inkplate 6 looks good to me on paper, though I haven't seen a
| real one yet.
| https://www.crowdsupply.com/e-radionica/inkplate-6
| bbernhard90 wrote:
| The Inkplate 6 works pretty well - I am using it for my
| digital picture frame. The only disappointing thing for me
| is, that they haven't released the actual source files
| (Eagle, Kicad, etc..) for the hardware yet. [1]
|
| [1] https://github.com/e-radionicacom/Inkplate-6-hardware/iss
| ues...
| imrelaxed wrote:
| You can buy a 7.5" e-ink hat for the RPI for around 60$.
| CharlesW wrote:
| I can find some for $150-250. Can you share links to less
| expensive options?
| sydd wrote:
| Look at waveshare's website. Get one with a HAT if the
| description says it needed, and always check out the
| refresh rate, it varies wildly (from ~0.5 secs to 15+ secs)
|
| I think they are Waveshare's supplier, you might even get
| cheaper/more specific stuff: https://www.good-
| display.com/product/6/
| fnord123 wrote:
| https://www.amazon.com/resolution-interface-Raspberry-Pi-
| XYG...
| darness-2 wrote:
| Ty. I was also looking for this.
| hedora wrote:
| I wonder if the orange tab can be folded over without
| damaging it.
| goliatone wrote:
| There is the m5paper[1] that is around $80 with shipping. It
| uses an esp32 and is arduino compatible, and the provided
| libraries are pretty good.
|
| [1] https://docs.m5stack.com/#/en/core/m5paper
| ianthehenry wrote:
| Oh my gosh. I've spent hours looking for something like this,
| and was never able to find one. Unfortunately they're out of
| stock right now, but I'll be ordering one as soon as I can.
| Thanks!
| qwertox wrote:
| I once bought a small E-Paper display [1] for a Raspi, and
| was very disappointed with the refresh rate, it was
| useless.
|
| I wanted to use it to display room temperature and
| electrical information like home power consumption, solar
| panel power generation and stuff like that, and expected a
| refresh rate of around 1 update per second.
|
| Having it blink and do stuff for around 7 seconds just to
| redraw the next frame made me send it back and replace it
| with a small LCD touchscreen [2].
|
| [1] Waveshare 1.54 Inch E-Paper Raw Display Panel(B)
| V2,200x200 Resolution,3.3v [
| https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B074P32F9B ]
|
| [2] ELEGOO Display 3.5" Zoll TFT LCD Touch Screen Monitor
| 480x320 fur Raspberry Pi mit Allen Daten und Touch Pen (SPI
| Schnittstelle) [
| https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B01JRUH0CY ]
|
| Edit:
|
| Look at all that needs to happen just to update the minute
| counter as well as the temperature and humidity. It
| certainly is faster than the colored display I bought, but
| still, do you really want such a flashing display?
| https://youtu.be/v9sNzmtMSXo?t=164
| dfox wrote:
| This apparently is about driving the ePaper correctly to
| produce intended image and not just using it as dumb
| framebuffer. The demo firmware for above mentioned
| M5Paper seems to have some support for intelligent
| driving of the display, sadly this is mostly not exposed
| to the (currently marked as alpha) MicroPython
| implementation for the device, where it only supports
| full (ie. "blinking") updates of rectangular regions.
| sydd wrote:
| Waveshare has some displays with really nice refresh
| rates, I bought a 6" one with ~300ms refresh rate:
| https://www.waveshare.com/6inch-HD-e-Paper-HAT.htm
| solarkraft wrote:
| A friend & I have a dream of building an E-reader based on the
| 10" ED097OC4 E-ink display that was built into the Kindle DX
| and can now be had for around 30EUR (old stock?).
|
| Most parts of the stack are conceptually figured out:
|
| A Pine64 SOPINE module (comparable to the Raspi CM, but
| cheaper), a Linux DRM driver based on tinydrm
| (https://github.com/notro/tinydrm) or gud
| (https://github.com/notro/gud/), as panel driver either
| vroland's ESP32 based EPDiy
| (https://hackaday.io/project/168193-epdiy-976-e-paper-
| control...) or a custom FPGA solution.
|
| What's really missing and I just can't figure out is how to get
| a touch input layer on there. Because the format is so weird
| there's just nothing available off the shelf at a fitting size.
| Cutting a larger one to size doesn't seem feasible (or is it?),
| perhaps the most DIYable would be an infrared solution like
| early kindles and old larger touch screens have, but on that
| topic there's a distinct lack of information (best I could find
| is this EEVblog video:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnZ9KfJNjRQ).
|
| A button-only navigation would really suck, since even KOReader
| (the absolute minimum application to run, preferable would be a
| full Wayland desktop) doesn't seem to be compatible with that.
|
| I figure this is the best place to ask: Does anyone have an
| idea how this could be solved? Also, would anyone be interested
| in E-reader kits like that?
| c-cube wrote:
| There's https://www.crowdsupply.com/e-radionica/inkplate-6 in
| this vein already.
| sydd wrote:
| This looks great! Except that the sizes are not my
| favourite... a 6" one and a 9.7" one.. I think the ideal
| size for a small tablet/ebook reader is 8". Also I dislike
| the huge bezels of the devices, I wonder if it would be
| possible to make with minimal bezels.
| Abishek_Muthian wrote:
| All the best with your endeavor, If it works out consider an
| external E-ink display for the next project as there's a
| needgap[1] for it.
|
| [1] https://needgap.com/problems/43-affordable-e-ink-large-
| exter... (Disclaimer : It's my platform).
| bbernhard90 wrote:
| A few months ago I built a E-ink picture frame, which displays
| an image that was taken today but x years ago. The picture
| frame now stands on my desk and already brought back some
| really nice memories.
|
| In case anyone is interested: https://mindfulbytes.io/
| captn3m0 wrote:
| Title is from the shop page[0], which has lesser information.
|
| [0]: https://shop.cutiepi.io/products/cutiepi-tablet
| globular-toast wrote:
| So no GPIO access or anything? If someone told me they were
| working on a "Raspberry Pi Project" I would have assumed it would
| be something taking advantage of that hardware. Do they really
| only mean they are programming something on Linux?
| alisonkisk wrote:
| It has gpio.
| terramex wrote:
| Does it?
|
| Board photo from their GitHub shows version 2.0 with GPIO
| pins [1], but it looks like updated version 2.1 [2] ditched
| GPIO and put microphone in its place.
|
| [1] https://camo.githubusercontent.com/1e615d82470b7e1dccbd18
| 583...
|
| [2] https://cutiepi.io/assets/pictures/board-detail.png
| [deleted]
| rhysfaulkner wrote:
| What should you do with this? https://smartpressurewasher.com
| warp wrote:
| This was a Kickstarter:
| https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/745629624/cutiepi-raspb...
|
| (I am a backer, but I haven't received mine yet, so don't yet
| have an opinion on the product)
| lupire wrote:
| > EVERYTHING, from the hardware design, firmware, enclosure,
| all the way to the user interface, is open source.
| kingosticks wrote:
| The cutiepi-enclosure/CutiePi_ID_spec.pdf file is marked as
| "confidential". Isn't that a little odd?
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Except VideoCore? Or has something changed?
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Everything this team produces and sells.
|
| This team isn't involved with the Raspberry Pi team.
| They're just using it in their open source product.
| geerlingguy wrote:
| Just wanted to drop a link here to a page I maintain tracking as
| many Pi CM4-based projects as I've found:
| https://pipci.jeffgeerling.com/boards_cm (including the CutiePi).
|
| The Compute Module 4 is the first revision (similar to the
| regular 4 model B) that is fast enough to actually be a
| practical/sensible replacement for a great deal of use cases
| where traditionally low power PC hardware would be preferred
| (though often more expensive).
|
| The one common theme though is the soldering of the hirose
| connectors is a bear to do manually.
| mattowen_uk wrote:
| Jeff's YouTube channel is also a delight[1], totally worth
| subscribing to!
|
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR-DXc1voovS8nhAvccRZhg
|
| ---
|
| [1] Red Shirt Jeff did not make me say this, honest.
| rzzzt wrote:
| Some day there might be an actual reason for sawing the board
| in half...
| Waterluvian wrote:
| The faq about battery concerns me a bit. "Achieved about 5 hours
| of standby time."
|
| Reporting standby time seems like a question dodge.
| MarkusWandel wrote:
| I see a sleep/wake button, but my Raspi 400 has no such
| feature, and googling about whether this can truly be done are
| inconclusive. 5h standby time suggests the sleep isn't a very
| deep one.
| dmos62 wrote:
| It might be hibernation, as in putting RAM on disk and
| shutting down.
| podiki wrote:
| Saw that too. Standby time usually means when it is not in use
| but can be woken up instantly. That's a far cry from actual
| usage time. :-| (Compare that too typical tablets where the
| standby time might be several days or longer, and usage time
| also much more than 5 hours. Or phones.)
| rzzzt wrote:
| I was more wondering about the display brightness value
| given. Is the display on during standby time measurements?
| ape4 wrote:
| It looks like the daughter board is bigger than the mother board
| (the rasp pi)
| rvense wrote:
| Daughter board is the wrong term, really. It's called a
| carrier.
| soneil wrote:
| This is perfectly normal in SoM projects. Effectively the
| carrier board is the motherboard, and the module takes the
| place of a socketed CPU.
| aboringusername wrote:
| Looking at the specs [1], I can't help but feel for $200 getting
| Wifi 4 (N, from 2008) and BT 4.0 (from 2010) leaves me
| underwhelmed. Maybe it was a cost decision, maybe licensing?
| Maybe due to power constraints? But damn, Wifi 4 is just
| objectively terrible and needs obliterating, it's borderline
| unusable and leaves me worried about the longevity of using such
| old standards in 2/3 years time (if that's the expecting lifetime
| of the product)
|
| 1: https://shop.cutiepi.io/products/cutiepi-tablet
| [deleted]
| hosteur wrote:
| > But damn, Wifi 4 is just objectively terrible and needs
| obliterating, it's borderline unusable
|
| Care to elaborate a bit on why ? I have been using n for years
| at home and at my office without any problems. It seems much
| faster than b and g which I had before.
| zamadatix wrote:
| Primary issue with N tends to be client density, secondary
| speed, but really both are related anyways. Also the compute
| module is single antenna, most N devices were at least 2x2
| which doubles the throughput. I.e. expect 100 Mbps half
| duplex throughput to be a "very good" connection on such a
| device.
|
| That being said the device actually supports WiFi 5, the page
| just seems to be out of date. Still only 1x1 though which is
| the bigger travesty.
| tjoff wrote:
| Wifi 4 is more than fine.
| syntheticnature wrote:
| Worth noting that WiFi 5 is 802.11ac, which only applies to
| 5Ghz; any WiFi 5 gear is using 802.11n for 2.4GHz. (Edit: Pi 4
| can do 5GHz) One wonders if they skipped doing a 5GHz antenna
| for cost/space/other reasons.
| aboringusername wrote:
| I'm kind of confused but by research [1] says the CM4 they've
| selected does indeed support wireless AC and BT 5.0 LE
|
| [1]: https://www.seeedstudio.com/Raspberry-Pi-Compute-Module-
| CM41...
| onesun wrote:
| I wonder if they just recently decided to go with the CM4
| module and failed to update the specs to match. The video
| shows them using the CM3 module, which does have lesser
| wifi/bt specs.
| opencl wrote:
| There was a previous version of this tablet using the CM3
| with wifi/BT hardware on the carrier board, they probably
| just forgot to update that part of the specs page. The new
| carrier board does not have wifi so they are definitely
| using the CM4's onboard wireless hardware.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| hutrdvnj wrote:
| Many older Thinkpad Models still have WiFi N, it's not that bad
| as you describe it.
| StevePerkins wrote:
| Two-hundred bucks is basically "impulse purchase" territory, but
| I'm nevertheless struggling to see the use case here.
|
| If you're into maker projects with Raspberry Pis, then I'm not
| sure what this does for you. It's a Pi already built into a
| consumer device. Not seemingly a platform for new maker projects.
|
| If you want a tablet with a Linux kernel buried in there
| somewhere, then there's probably a thousand Android options with
| better specs at the price point.
|
| Just kinda seems like a tablet with with limited apps and
| terrible battery life, being marketed to Pi fans who think having
| "Pi" in its name will make it a good conversation piece.
| isaiahg wrote:
| I have a use for this for sure. I got two 400 models for my 3
| and 4 yo and installed all the Linux educational software.
| Recently I started working on my own educational games for them
| in C and having something like this I can carry around the
| house to code on vim while I watch them would be super handy.
| tartoran wrote:
| A surface tablet with a linux image is underrated IMO. They
| are good and capable hardware and can be had for cheap. I
| don't understand why PI is used for a tablet when its purpose
| is a standalone device with IO capabilities or for
| experimenting. I went on this path and bought a few linux
| first devices and while fun they did not perform even close
| to an consumer device which with the right image (linux) it
| could become a very good daily driver.
| akhilcacharya wrote:
| I'm intrigued, which model Surface with which Linux distro
| would you recommend in the "impulse buy" territory?
| botto wrote:
| The pitch of this project is not great imo.
|
| Not sure saying it's an open source table is any better but
| calling it a tool for keeping projects on the go is also just
| weird.
| dastx wrote:
| Their software and hardware are open source. Far cry from
| alternative android tablets. Either way, building a tablet,
| even based on a raspberry pi, is no easy feat.
| hanniabu wrote:
| I was really hoping this would be a "bring your own pi"
| solution rather than a build in one. If it were BYOP then it'd
| be great for portable devices like field readings (hydroponic
| nutrient readings around the greenhouse, wilderness env
| readings, etc) or taking retropi gaming on the go. I feel like
| having it built in dampens that portability aspect, especially
| since RPIs are often reused for various projects.
| alisonkisk wrote:
| There are exist laptop shells for your pi
| hanniabu wrote:
| With batteries too? Know of the name? The only ones I've
| seen are the size of suitcases.
| stuart78 wrote:
| I've been thinking about my kid's first computer and something
| in this ballpark is interesting. More hackable than iPad, not
| quite the complexity of a laptop. Not sure this one is quite
| right' especially compared to the Pi400, but nice to have the
| tablet form factor.
| prox wrote:
| Pi400 is a fun thing. How much more powerful is the Pi400?
| prox wrote:
| One of the first things I bought for my Pi was a battery HAT
| and with VNC on, I use my iPad as its screen, and a BT keyboard
| from an old Mac. It's the best of both worlds. I can take the
| Pi anywhere and work on some Python projects. I went out in
| nature and it is quite cool to have your tools of the trade
| with you. Perhaps this fits in that kind of -maybe niche- use
| case.
| asabjorn wrote:
| Can you please add details on what hardware you bought and
| what battery life you have achieved? I want to build
| something similar.
| prox wrote:
| Sure! I bought this HAT :
| https://www.pishop.us/product/pijuice-hat-a-portable-
| power-p... and I also bought the AUKEY model pb-t3 16000mAh
| as an external battery, as it was recommended for this
| setup by people on the Raspberry forums. You can charge the
| HAT 4 times, or your Ipad.
|
| The battery lasts long enough, I run some services and some
| other tools and the HAT alone will last you a day or so. If
| you do something like video encoding, it will burn quicker
| obviously. Think phone battery levels of juice with the
| HAT.
| lodovic wrote:
| This could be nice for a hobby project, as it will probably be
| much easier to customize and develop for than an Android tablet,
| but it has no GPIO pins. So I can't just connect it to a
| breadboard and use it as a console for a prototype. Still, this
| could be very interesting for certain types of applications.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| I've been following this project for a while. I truly hope they
| succeed, but as always some caution is warranted about
| crowdfunding projects.
|
| They ran a Kickstarter last year with a target ship date of late
| November, but I'm not sure how many orders they've filled. None
| of my friends who ordered have received theirs.
|
| Their open source repositories are available here:
| https://github.com/cutiepi-io
|
| Note this isn't a tablet in the traditional sense. Think of it as
| a Raspberry Pi with external touchscreen, camera, and battery
| folded into a tablet-like form factor. They've done some cool
| things with software and hardware to bring it all together, but
| it needs to be viewed as hackable open source hardware and not a
| competitor to a cheap Android tablet from Amazon.
| warp wrote:
| The reason they're late is because they switched from the
| Raspbarry Pi 3 compute module to the (then recently
| announced/released) Raspberry Pi 4 compute module very late
| into the project.
|
| I would have preferred if they had shipped what they had,
| instead of delaying the project for that upgrade, but it seems
| most backers preferred to get the shiny new thing, even if it
| meant the project was delayed.
| botto wrote:
| I think if they had stuck to the CM3 this would have lived a
| short life of "Oh, this is neat, but ugh so sluggish and
| can't really use it" to now it's an actually viable
| alternative to low powered laptop/tablet as you can upgrade
| it to the cm4 with 8gb ram
| mrtweetyhack wrote:
| The change shouldn't be that drastic to hold up the project?
| kmfrk wrote:
| Would love to see a bullet point about repairability somewhere.
| That's one of the most compelling points about indie projects
| like this for me.
| amelius wrote:
| And the ability to run (an open flavor of) Linux.
| spicybright wrote:
| Besides swapping the Pi out I'd imagine there's very little
| repair ability. PCB with tiny components, custom screen, etc.
| botto wrote:
| Considering all the hardware and software is open source the
| repairability will be high, obviously you will need some
| tools to do it.
| spicybright wrote:
| Tools are easy. But if a company can't supply replacement
| parts then your SOL with any repairs.
| Sunspark wrote:
| There are a lot of people with old tablets in a drawer.. it'd be
| nice if there was a way to re-purpose those old screens many of
| which are good quality (e.g. Ipad 2, HP Touchpad, etc). So a new
| shell would be needed, the new PCB, likely the new battery, so
| the only real hard part would be the interface between the pi and
| the screen.
| amelius wrote:
| No GPIOs?
| rhysfaulkner wrote:
| I don't know about it https://smartpressurewasher.com
| temp8964 wrote:
| > we plan to support Raspberry Pi OS desktop and apps via
| XWayland.
|
| I am not familiar with the Linux Ecosystem, so I don't understand
| what this really means. Can someone please explain? Will any
| Linux apps run on it directly or do developers have to create
| separate apps just for the platform?
| Shared404 wrote:
| Yes, Linux apps should run natively.
|
| X is the display server on Linux for decades back, and XWayland
| is the compatibility layer for it built into the newer display
| server Wayland.
| opencl wrote:
| It's just a Pi running ARM64 Linux.
|
| The default OS image that ships on the devices has their own
| touch UI shell which currently runs on EGLFS, which is
| basically an alternative to X or Wayland meant for embedded
| devices. So as it currently stands you can't run normal Linux
| apps in the default OS.
|
| They're supposedly porting it to Wayland which will allow
| normal Linux applications to run within their custom shell.
| Their shell is a relatively straightforward Qt Quick
| application so it shouldn't take a huge amount of work to port.
| Though the most recent commit was a little over a year ago[1]
| so who knows when it'll actually get finished.
|
| [1] https://github.com/cutiepi-io/cutiepi-shell/tree/wayland
| SMAAART wrote:
| But... why not android?
|
| Could I get one and install Android on it?
| gavodavo wrote:
| For that you'll need to port Android to the RPi4 and then to
| this. Doesn't seem impossible though.
| yspeak wrote:
| I don't get it. This doesn't have a pi in it, it's "pi
| compatible" ? Looks dangerously close to trademark infringement ?
| Maybe patent infringement? Why "pi compatible"? I suppose this
| means software not hardware since not same form factor and no I/o
| pins ?? Why not just say it's a linux machine? This is open
| source but pi is not ?
| rodolphoarruda wrote:
| Congratulations and good luck.
|
| I wish my kids could take their online classes using this device
| instead of their phones.
| terramex wrote:
| Is the rear-facing camera connected using standard CSI interface
| and can it be swapped for RPi HQ Camera?
|
| I sometimes use HQ Cam in the field and for now I use RPi 4 with
| 7" touchscreen and external power bank so this tablet would be
| great usability upgrade.
| kodah wrote:
| This is very cool. I'm really looking forward to the day that I
| have a Linux tablet with something like an S-Pen. Every year is
| the Year of Linux on the Desktop, but I'm ready to add tablet and
| maybe phone to that too.
| marcodiego wrote:
| What I really want: a non toy Crowpi2[0].
|
| [0] https://www.elecrow.com/crowpi2.html
| JoeDaDude wrote:
| Yes! A good, close-to-pro level Pi based laptop. Brownie points
| if it includes a SDR.
| hedora wrote:
| The pinebook pro is close to that. It has a different software
| ecosystem, but is also much faster when web browsing than a
| Pi4: https://www.pine64.org/pinebook-pro/
| marcodiego wrote:
| I want something I can put my favorite arm sbc inside.
| yspeak wrote:
| Ah nm see it's using the pi module. Pretty cool project.
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