[HN Gopher] Hackberry-Pi_Zero - A handheld Linux terminal using ...
___________________________________________________________________
Hackberry-Pi_Zero - A handheld Linux terminal using Raspberry Pi
Zero 2W
Author : felixr
Score : 558 points
Date : 2024-08-02 13:34 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| more_corn wrote:
| This is super neat! Well done. Very well done. I love the dual
| battery, hard power switch, good keyboard.
|
| I know how hard it is to do these right and I'm impressed.
| atrus wrote:
| This is one of the very few Cyberdeck kinda things that looks
| like it could be actually useful. I love it!
| bloopernova wrote:
| I have a vague idea of what my ideal Cyberdeck would be, no
| idea if there's anything like this already:
|
| One of those super-wide small screens, 1920x720 or thereabouts,
| with the screen split into 2 terminals. Since I'm wishing, I'd
| also like that screen to have a 300 to 600ppi e-ink screen
| built in to a layer, so that when the colour screen is off, the
| e-ink is visible.
|
| A PC, x86_64 or arm64, built into the screen, with lots of
| ports, IO, compatible with Pi hats/shields. For extra coolness,
| a pluggable system like Framework so if someone wants a real
| RS232 port, they can get one. With USB-C power so I can use any
| powerbank or other compatible power supply.
|
| A Keychron lightweight Alice-style keyboard, folding a bonus,
| QMK mandatory, standard bluetooth and/or USB.
| swores wrote:
| I wasn't expecting to see buy now links, so I wasn't too
| disappointed when I did see them but found they both say out of
| stock - was completely ready to impulse buy the BB Q20 keyboard
| version (or either, really!) and hope that having registered to
| hear it more being sold I'll be able to get one.
|
| I'd almost be tempted to try to put one together myself, but it's
| not something I'd find particularly easy and there's other stuff
| I'd rather spend time on. But might be tempted...
| walterbell wrote:
| Stock ETA is 1 or 2 weeks, depending on model.
| swores wrote:
| Yep thanks, I'm indeed hoping to take advantage of that!
|
| But I have a sneaking suspicion it won't be a big enough
| quantity to satisfy even the people who've seen this HN
| submission so may well come down to what time of day / how
| quickly I see the email
| walterbell wrote:
| Both models say "Sold out since Aug 02". If all the
| existing stock was bought by HN readers today, then 1-2
| weeks isn't bad for the next batch, and today's waitlist
| can influence batch size. There seem to be lots of BB
| keyboards on Amazon, so hopefully the constraint is funding
| and manufacturing, not components. Lots of demand from HN
| can only help with funding!
| swores wrote:
| I saw this thread almost immediately after it was posted
| and both versions were already out of stock when I got to
| those pages minutes later, so my assumption was that
| there either were very few devices (just a couple of
| PoCs) or that sales had come from somewhere other than
| HN, either way leaving the majority of people who want to
| buy it from seeing this thread on the waiting list with
| me.
|
| Though maybe I'm wrong about how popular it will be, and
| actually only the handful of people who've explicitly
| commented about wanting to buy it, like me, will have
| joined the waiting list and some may then decide not to
| buy it having slept on it - but it's definitely possible
| that lots of people are looking forward to getting one or
| more!)
|
| I also assumed that it was a fairly DYI project done by a
| single founder (DYI as in him making them himself one by
| one, rather than having either a team or an outsourced
| factory ready to scale up to meet whatever demand is on
| the waiting list), but again I may be guessing wrong (or
| may have forgotten something they wrote that shows I'm
| wrong), but it's a few hours past my bedtime so I'll just
| hope that when I wake up they might have replied to my
| message asking if I could reserve one rather than spend
| more time guessing about their production capacity :D )
| rbanffy wrote:
| If it used the Blackberry Passport format (and screen) I'd love
| it even more.
| anonzzzies wrote:
| Shame it's not available for purchase at the moment. Would like
| one.
| walterbell wrote:
| https://www.tindie.com/products/zitaotech/hackberrypi-cyberd...
| More HackPi Q10 will be restock within 5 days. More
| HackPi Q20 will be restock in 2 weeks.
| anonzzzies wrote:
| Oh thanks, I missed that. Didn't know this site.
| dchuk wrote:
| This form factor is so tempting. I've gotten close to pulling the
| trigger on the minimal phone like 5 times but just don't know if
| I can actually reasonably switch from my iPhone and not end up
| annoyed with the change (https://www.minimalcompany.com/).
|
| But a calm, keyboard oriented device just seems great.
| smashah wrote:
| The N900 (or N810) form factor is also great, especially for
| CLI commands/coding.
|
| There was a team trying to bring it back to life (neo900)
| marcodiego wrote:
| I wonder if simply adding one of these ESP with GSM builtin would
| turn this into a practical linux phone.
| prmoustache wrote:
| You'd need an additionnal micro and speaker, or at least some
| usb-c headset but yeah this give some ideas.
|
| Also battery life would probably sink.
| wildzzz wrote:
| The GPIO port is accessible under the back cover so I could
| easily see add-on modules that could piggyback on. Design a
| small backpack to use the existing latch, add some tiny pogo
| pins and the module could be easily swapped out. A lorawan
| transceiver and a GPS receiver would be an excellent pair.
| hawski wrote:
| Unfortunately advertised battery life isn't practical. Though
| maybe with software enchantments it could get there.
| notpeter wrote:
| Very similar to the Beepberry. Exciting to see someone else
| building into that form factor. Also love to fun to see the Nokia
| BL-5C battery (originally introduced in the Nokia 3650 in 2003)
| still alive and kicking 20years later.
|
| https://blog.beeper.com/2023/05/16/beeper-x-sqmfi-beepberry/
| jsheard wrote:
| That appears to have been renamed to the Beepy, and the product
| page now has the repurposed Blackberry keyboard blurred out.
| Did whoever owns the corpse of Blackberry go after them for
| trademark infringement?
|
| https://beepy.sqfmi.com/
| itomato wrote:
| Is this when they start pre installing QNX?
| https://carleton.ca/rcs/qnx/installing-qnx-on-raspberry-
| pi-4...
| ntw1103 wrote:
| Looks super awesome. I've been slowly working towards building
| pretty much the same thing, but haven't had enough time to
| finish. I added myself to the wait list. Intend to purchase 3 if
| I'm able to. Getting everything into such a nice packet is very
| cool.
| zitterbewegung wrote:
| Wow this is amazing it's the best cyber deck I have ever seen or
| would consider using. I wonder if you could get rid of one
| battery and shove in a 4g LTE modem connected to a usb port.
| anotherjesse wrote:
| Has anyone built something like this in the hiptop/sidekick
| format?
|
| If not, this might be a good second option for hacking together a
| chat device for LLMs with notes
|
| I had been thinking about using
| https://www.lilygo.cc/products/t-deck as a base - but prefer
| using Linux to microcontrollers
| garciasn wrote:
| I miss my Hiptop(s). Nothing has come close to that experience
| since. I could carry on 10 AIM conversations, IRC, and be doing
| browsing and email while typing at ~100 WPM.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It looks neat.
|
| It is a shame, though, to use an RPi and not exploit the GPIO
| pins a little more. Maybe add a slot on the side to fit some
| probes or something?
|
| I guess the Pi is all digital anyway so maybe the pins are not
| _as_ interesting...
| amelius wrote:
| It has DAC/ADC ports, I suppose.
| boguscoder wrote:
| Pins are still pretty handy though. Tangential to the OPs use
| case, but I use my Zero 2 as a debug probe (with openocd) for
| few MCUs (mostly Pi Pico), and it comes out $$$ cheaper than
| JLink's official one and analogs
| amelius wrote:
| Is there a page where they describe where they sourced the
| components, e.g. screen and keyboard?
| walterbell wrote:
| Amazon has vendors listing BB Q10 parts, including keyboard and
| LCD for < $20,
| https://www.amazon.com/s?k=blackberry+q10+keyboard+replaceme...
|
| Fairberry has a PCB design for adding Q10 keyboard to any
| mobile phone with a USB port,
| https://github.com/Dakkaron/Fairberry
| keheliya wrote:
| Amazing! How hard will it be to replace the screen to an eInk one
| similar to the beepberry/beepy? I love everything except the
| screen, and I assume eInk will be the perfect match considering
| the terminal and power consumption.
| afandian wrote:
| I bought the Bluetooth keyboard from this maker, ZitaoTech. The
| fit and finish was excellent. Highly recommended.
| henearkr wrote:
| So it's a recently made clone of the keyboard, rather than an
| original one?
|
| The readme is unclear on this subject, they advertise "original
| keyboard".
| afandian wrote:
| To be clear I mean this:
| https://www.tindie.com/products/zitaotech/blackberry-
| bb9900-...
|
| It's an original new old stock BlackBerry keyboard, packaged
| in a good 3d printed case with Bluetooth, USB and battery
| charger.
| henearkr wrote:
| Oh ok! Thanks.
| 83457 wrote:
| Looks like it could be a great pocket device for pico-8
| development.
| grugagag wrote:
| That's my thoughts as well. I ordered a uConsole from
| clockworkPI, long waitlist there. This is tempting me again. I
| feel this may have even better ergonomic qualitty for my
| personal taste and appeara more portable.
| 83457 wrote:
| Every time I see a little game/dev device with a square
| screen I think about pico-8.
|
| The devterm looks like it could be a good device too as you
| could have pico-8 running on one side with code editor taking
| up the rest of the screen.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XC5lC9nGWM
| ngcc_hk wrote:
| Order one. Dead on arrival. Gave up. Now may think to savage
| at least the rpi ...
| grugagag wrote:
| Sorry to hear. How many months after you ordered it did you
| actually receive it? Im taking a gamble on this but wasn't
| aware they do no testing before shipping.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| There's a _waitlist_ for the uconsole? I was planning to buy
| one but that made me reconsider.
| joemazerino wrote:
| Awesome work.
|
| Know any surplus stores that carry BB keyboards?
| walterbell wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41139869
| neon_me wrote:
| Would love to see "real phone" version w gsm/lte module and at
| least a day lasting battery (optimization)
| oneplane wrote:
| Isn't that what the PinePhone and Librem 5 are? They don't have
| an embedded physical keyboard and do have a touchscreen, so the
| physical features are slightly different, but otherwise they
| are still a mobile ARM linux computer.
| Y_Y wrote:
| The touchscreen is a big difference though. You need to run
| some kind of graphical environment to handle the touch input
| and then it's slow and you have a crappy keyboard. I love my
| pinephone, but even with sxmo I find it unresponsive and
| hard.to work on. The keyboard shell for the pinephone is
| good, but changes the form factor then.
| tetris11 wrote:
| Nokia N900 has a pinephone port
| wifipunk wrote:
| I've been wanting to build my own handheld ever since I picked up
| a 3d printer so the last few months I've been checking these
| builds out. The blackberry keyboard is my favorite part of the
| build, definitely going to do the same for mine. Looks great with
| the casing.
| deepspace wrote:
| I am working on the same kind of thing. For me the ideal
| keybaord/screen combination was the Keyboard Featherwing from
| Adafruit https://www.adafruit.com/product/4818 . Unfortunately,
| it is a discontinued product. I managed to snag one of the last
| ones, but I am reluctant to use something that I cannot get any
| more of.
| starik36 wrote:
| There is also the Tindie Null 2 kit - it's built around Rapsberry
| Pi Zero 2W. I picked one up several years ago and built a gameboy
| replacement of sorts. It was a lot of fun. Lots of soldering.
|
| https://www.tindie.com/products/ampersand/null-2-kit/
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| Oh great! Another awesome looking cyberdeck that I want to own
| and will find absolutely no practical use for.
|
| I've added myself to the waitlist already.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| See I do have a use for this kind of thing, but not exactly. I
| have a few desktop towers and Raspberry Pi devices that
| sometimes due to upgrades or random acts of Zeus absolutely
| fail to boot up. I want some ability to connect a keyboard and
| a screen to these so I can see the actual boot screen. Normally
| for me this involves lugging the device to my office and
| connecting it to my office monitor and keyboard which is highly
| inconvenient given that some are in the attic. Instead I want a
| small screen and keyboard in one device I can hook up to an
| HDMI or VGA or mini HDMI or just a serial port + USB for
| keyboard. Something lightweight I can carry anywhere.
|
| And no that doesn't need its own computer but it might be nice
| to have one to be able to hook it up to the network and
| download and transfer files to the broken machine or be able to
| download and quickly boot off a rescue image or some such.
|
| These are rare enough problems that I don't actually bother
| building a device like that but every time they do happen I
| wish I did.
| T3OU-736 wrote:
| I _think_ you are describing (minus the screen) what a PiKVM
| and similar would give you.
| rft wrote:
| I can confirm that getting a PiKVM has very much eliminated
| lugging around my server or a screen. Having some form of
| display input would be the one feature I would wish to add
| if given the choice. Not having HDMI-In, e.g. via capture
| card, makes sense in this form factor and power budget, but
| would make this an instant buy for me. I would really enjoy
| having a small, very portable device to debug things with.
|
| I recently got linked to a CCTV tester [1] that at least
| handles the display part. Sadly it does not seem to have
| keyboard emulation. It might be possible to hack this in as
| this is an Android tablet at its core and the USB
| controller might support gadget mode.
|
| [1] https://www.rsrteng.com/products/ipc-9800movtadhs-pro
| password4321 wrote:
| I too have this use case troubleshooting headless computers
| around the house. I saw an ad for https://www.aurga.com and
| bought one for $84. It connects to an app on my Android phone
| as display, keyboard, and mouse. Minor discussion 7 months
| ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38609526
|
| Long ago I bought a mini keyboard + mouse combo for input;
| the custom wireless USB dongle edition I have (strongly
| preferred over Bluetooth when troubleshooting) is no longer
| for sale. https://amzn.com/dp/B00I5SW8MC
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| Logitech has similar devices. This isn't the one I own, but
| it's close.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Wireless-Keyboard-
| Touchpad-P...
| rft wrote:
| I have that keyboard and gifted one to my parents. Our
| use case is the odd chance you need to input text or use
| a browser on a Smart TV. Works so much faster than the on
| screen keyboard. With many Smart TVs just being Android
| under the hood, it just works.
|
| I find for server troubleshooting, I usually have no
| problem grabbing a random USB keyboard. The bigger
| problem is finding a screen at a convenient location and
| connecting that one. It often was easier to carry my
| server to the screen instead of the other way.
|
| On the topic of niche input methods, I also have an "air
| mouse" [1] with a full keyboard on the back for my Kodi
| system or when connecting my desktop to the TV. I
| essentially never need to use it, but it has come in
| handy.
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B0B1HKWFQV
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| The iPad now supports external webcams, so you can use a
| $5 HDMI capture card (and the free Genki Studio app) to
| turn it into a monitor.
| CitrusFruits wrote:
| I have one of these and it's great for this sort of
| thing. The whole keyboard runs off one AA battery which
| lasts forever, and it even has a storage spot for the USB
| dongle.
| rft wrote:
| This looks quite interesting, thanks for the link. It does
| seem to require a native viewer instead of having a web
| interface. I would really prefer just a website like the
| PiKVM. Might still get it.
|
| I have to do an off-topic rant though. The marketing page
| you linked to does not really state what this device does.
| It has a nice look into the case and a lot of buzzwords,
| but nothing like a small section with "HDMI Input" or "USB
| keyboard emulation". Even the shop page is somewhat light
| on details, but it at least shows (in GIFs only) that it
| works as a display and has a USB port. If I wasn't given
| your comment as context, I would likely not have gotten the
| use case and closed the tab. Based on the form factor being
| similar to a Fire TV stick etc. I would have assumed you
| plug it into a Hotel TV or similar to work on that.
|
| EDIT: Saw your edit now and I think it is kind of funny
| that the old HN thread is also mentioning the marketing.
| password4321 wrote:
| On the other end of the spectrum, searching https://hn.algo
| lia.com/?query=handheld%20comments%3E0&sort=b... I found
| the $1000 8" GPD Pocket 3 which supports Windows 11 and KVM
| discussed in 2021:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29110603
|
| https://gpd.hk/gpdpocket3
| ethagnawl wrote:
| Those combo devices are incredibly useful in a pinch -- I
| keep one in my backpack. I've used it countless times while
| working on interactive installations and also while messing
| around with Pis at home.
| Ductapemaster wrote:
| Looks like those mini keyboards are available on AliExpress
| quite cheap!
|
| https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804879544433.html
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| I have this exact same problem. I wonder how they solve this
| issue in datacenters and if that solution could apply to the
| home setting.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| From what I understand, KVM setup is what is used. In the
| olden days it used to be a keyboard and monitor in every
| rack with a switch to connect to all the machines in the
| rack. Nowadays I'm sure it is more software than hardware
| but same principle. A home setup would be a laptop form
| factor device that can take in different video inputs and
| has a keyboard. A mouse wouldn't even be required but I
| guess wouldn't be hard to add. It would need a battery for
| the monitor but really would need no brains at all.
|
| Another option would be a computer that can do video in and
| act as a USB HID for the keyboard/mouse but then allow you
| to connect to it via VNC. This really could be amazing if
| you could just plug in two cables and then go to your
| laptop to connect to it.
| walterbell wrote:
| $40 RISC-V networked KVM for remote 1080p 60fps video,
| keyboard and power control, 2" cube,
| https://sipeed.com/nanokvm
| snvzz wrote:
| Sadly, proprietary firmware makes it useless.
| walterbell wrote:
| iPad + HDMI input dongle can be an HDMI monitor. iPad +
| GetConsole app + Redpark [1] USB-serial cable = serial
| console. The missing piece is USB keyboard emulation, but
| serial->arduino [2] might work.
|
| iPad + $40 RISC-V piKVM-alike [3] is another option.
| [1] https://redpark.com/usb-c-serial-cable [2]
| https://www.sjoerdlangkemper.nl/2022/11/16/running-etherkey-
| on-arduino-leonardo/ [3] https://sipeed.com/nanokvm
| itintheory wrote:
| They make USB KVM devices. Run an application on your
| computer to send input / receive output. Then you can use
| whatever laptop you want. That said, I've only used them on
| Windows, so drivers might be an issue.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Would that work with a BIOS? Boot loader?
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| Yes, the pikvm (or nanokvm) devices are cheap KVM over IP
| and they take input from the HDMI output of the
| server/pc, so you see just the same as you would if you
| were stood in front of the physical monitor plugged into
| the HDMI. They also come with the motherboard connector
| so you can do a power-off/power-on remotely. You can
| change BIOS settings and even do a full OS install
| remotely.
| vladxyz wrote:
| take a look at the gpd pocket 3, with kvm module. sounds
| exactly like what you're looking for
| pastorhudson wrote:
| I picked up a used 7 inch "dslr monitor" with hdmi input for
| about $99 I keep it in a cheap harbor freight pelican style
| case.
| jeden wrote:
| What You thing about linux handheld like Sony Clie UX 50 ? Good
| keyboard, nice screen and camera, long time working.
|
| Yes, I'm dreaming too.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| I want this so bad.
| GardenLetter27 wrote:
| It looks cool, but I've found the Steam Deck is the only portable
| computer that's versatile enough for me to actually use for all
| sorts of different stuff.
| dsp_person wrote:
| Anyone know if steam deck can act as a USB OTG keyboard?
|
| I remember this being a cool feature of those GPD Pocket
| computers. It would be cool to hook something up to the USB and
| send keystrokes from the steam deck (not necessarily from the
| touchscreen keyboard, but by scripts).
| fragmede wrote:
| you have to enable USB Dual-Role Device in the BIOS settings
| for it to act as a device, but yes.
| dsp_person wrote:
| ah thanks for that. I was searching for OTG not DRD
|
| This is cool https://github.com/Frederic98/GadgetDeck
| canuckintime wrote:
| >> Steam Deck is the only portable computer that's versatile...
|
| Would you clarify your categorization?
|
| I personally consider 'portable computer' to be any computer
| with an internal battery (including laptops etc). I don't find
| the Steam Deck especially versatile in that category.
|
| A separate/sub-category for me would be 'pocketable computers'
| (like this Hackberry-Pi_Zero, the GPD Win mini etc) for which
| the Steam Deck would be unusually versatile--albeit the Steam
| Deck does NOT fit in any of my pants or jacket pockets.
| teraflop wrote:
| This looks like a pretty cool device!
|
| However, I was immediately curious about how the "dual battery"
| feature works. The IP5306 power-management IC seems to be
| designed only for a single battery, and as far as I can tell from
| the schematic[1], the two battery connectors are just directly
| connected to each other in parallel (across VBAT and GND).
|
| This seems really sketchy. If you plug in two batteries that are
| not at the same state-of-charge, then you're going to get a very
| large current flowing from the higher-voltage battery to the
| lower-voltage one, probably significantly exceeding the
| batteries' rated current limits. At best this wastes a lot of
| power and generates a lot of heat, and at worst it could be a
| fire hazard.
|
| [1]: https://github.com/ZitaoTech/Hackberry-
| Pi_Zero/blob/main/Sch...
| fecal_henge wrote:
| At best this wastes a lot of power and generates a lot of heat,
| and at worst it could be a fire hazard. - you just described my
| high spec HP laptop.
| zitterbewegung wrote:
| If you ran it with one battery would you not have the problem ?
| teraflop wrote:
| There's no problem if you use one battery, and there should
| also be no problem if you use two batteries and
| charge/discharge them both simultaneously (because then the
| voltages are matched).
|
| The problem shows up when you try to "hot-swap" just one of
| the batteries and replace it with one at a different state of
| charge, as the README claims you can do.
| fecal_henge wrote:
| What is the expectation here about functionality? They are
| using some kind of COTS battery system to keep the cost
| down, but at the consequence of this safety qustion. Should
| these people expect any buyer to antipate this? Its not
| really a consumer product after all.
|
| I think there is no shortage of battery management ICs, but
| the number that can arbitrate between external
| power/battery A/Battery B certainly eliminates 97% on your
| Digikey parametrics.
| aftbit wrote:
| IMO my expectation is that they not do that. If they want
| to offer hot-swappable batteries, they should either do
| it right (with a more functional battery management IC or
| a little homebrewed FET-switching circuit), or they
| should at least come up with a hack that doesn't threaten
| the battery safety. For example, have a physical switch
| to select between the two batteries and instruct the user
| to flip it when one gets low. Use a super capacitor to
| cover the short time while the switch is between
| connections.
| numpad0 wrote:
| It feels to me that the fact that there are no readily
| available BMS chip that supports this type of circuit
| indicates something. But maybe I'm mistaken...
| diggan wrote:
| I understood it as it'll use only one of the batteries, but you
| can swap between which is used. So initially, you have two
| charged batteries, while using only one. Once you run out of
| power in the first one, you'll switch to the second, and now
| the first one could be swapped to a fully charged one.
| Blue/green deployments, but for batteries basically.
| teraflop wrote:
| It would be convenient if it worked that way, but since the
| batteries are connected across each other in parallel, they
| will both be discharged simultaneously. And as soon as you
| hot-swap one of the nearly-discharged batteries for a charged
| one, it'll be more-or-less short circuited across its
| discharged counterpart.
|
| To do what you describe, you would need additional components
| to "switch" one battery at a time into the power path. (This
| can be done with a single transistor if you're only worried
| about current flowing in one direction, but I believe it's
| trickier if you want to support both charging and discharging
| in the same circuit.)
| dheera wrote:
| null
| teraflop wrote:
| Yes, that is exactly what I said at the beginning of this
| thread.
| samstave wrote:
| I asked the following above - does this work?
|
| >> A mid-stream capacitor is holding enough charge for 10
| seconds to allow indivdual swapping out -- and also this is
| meant? to mean that you can swap TWO NEW batteries in
| without having to shutdown/sleep/power interrupt - thus the
| 10 seconds.... that dope
|
| EDIT: I was imagining the capacitor holds up the whole
| thing for ten seconds to swap out both bats...
| teraflop wrote:
| In theory you _could_ do that, but it has its own costs
| and complications. And if you 're going to add a big
| enough capacitor to ride out a battery swap, why bother
| with two batteries instead of just one?
| numpad0 wrote:
| Hotswap of two parallel batteries must replace both with
| a matched pair. Otherwise the one at higher state of
| charge starts charging others without current limit.
| johnklos wrote:
| I read this part:
|
| > Replace your battery in 10 seconds without killing the power!
|
| as a suggestion that you'd have four batteries total, and you'd
| have two that're fully charged, and you'd replace one battery,
| and within seconds you'd replace the other. Or at least that's
| how I'd do it.
|
| I've recently read up about power management and battery
| charging, and want to make a charge controller than can connect
| two separate banks. I wonder how hard it'd be to change the
| IP5306 in the Hackberry Pi Zero to handle the two batteries
| separately.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| And if you screw up which battery is which?
|
| "Do things exactly right, quickly, or the device bursts into
| flames*" is not acceptable electronics design, even for
| something you intend to use yourself.
|
| * do you really want to trust a generic battery's built-in
| protection IC?
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| Maybe I'm being too generous but I feel like 99.9% of the
| people using something like this would do it properly
| Nab443 wrote:
| .. until their curious child decides to have a look at
| it.
| II2II wrote:
| Now that I'm aware, sure. If I wasn't told, I would
| assume that they were designed so that a new battery
| could be swapped in while one battery remained inserted
| to maintain power (much like an old Thinkpad I used to
| own).
| tedunangst wrote:
| It should definitely use the plural, batteries, if that's the
| intention.
| wanderingjew wrote:
| acktually, traditionally, 'batteries' referred to two or
| more cells. This keeps with the etymology of the word as an
| emplacement of cannon or guns. If OP meant a single cell,
| they should have written 'cell', not the singular
| 'battery'.
| samstave wrote:
| A mid-stream capacitor is holding enough charge for 10
| seconds to allow indivdual swapping out -- and also this is
| meant? to mean that you can swap TWO NEW batteries in without
| having to shutdown/sleep/power interrupt - thus the 10
| seconds.... that _dope_
| outworlder wrote:
| If there's a capacitor... what about adding a switch to allow
| you to select which battery you are using? Then you can
| replace whatever you are not using without issue.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| I was going to launch into a lecture about how battery
| isolation is a Thing, very simple, etc and the author couldn't
| possibly be dumb enough to not isolate them with diodes, but
| then I looked at the schematic and yiiiiiiiikes, they're both
| just tied together, I think. There's a charge management IC and
| a MOSFET as part of the USB power input...and that's it.
|
| I was sketched out by BSI not being connected to anything, but
| it seems it's a fixed resistance battery size/chemistry ID
| function, not a temperature sensor. That said, I don't see any
| over/under temperature protection except for some sort of vague
| temperature limit in the charge IC (which is not thermally
| coupled to the battery in any way, so only a general "the
| device is way too hot"), so hopefully that's in the battery -
| don't go buying any cheapo clones.
|
| I also don't see any fusing, which is a huge no-no. A polyfuse
| is a twenty cent (ish) part. Again, an official battery would
| have an internal BMS circuit and prevent overcurrent events,
| but people are probably going to go for the almost-cheapest
| battery on Amazon/Ebay. Not to mention counterfeit problems
| even if you do try to get an OEM battery.
| szundi wrote:
| Oh, houses can burn down by not putting in 2 diodes and ptc
| fuses
| freedomben wrote:
| I agree, this is a pretty bad idea. I've used batteries in
| parallel many times, but it's always in the context of treating
| it as a single "bank" that is always charged at the same level,
| not as individual batteries which can be swapped separately.
| Swapping a full battery in when the other one is low is going
| to result in a rapid rebalance of power until they get to the
| same level!
|
| You can think of it like having two big swimming pools side by
| side, slowly draining out into a little stream. If the two
| pools are at the same level and the wall between them
| disappeared, they're largely going to be fine and keep on
| going.
|
| Now imagine one pool is nearly empty and the other is full. As
| soon as you disappear that wall in the middle, there's gonna be
| a very powerful wave as the water from the high pool rushes in
| to fill the empty pool.
| userbinator wrote:
| It looks like two BL-5Cs, which normally come with their own
| overcurrent protection (AFAIK even the no-name generic clone
| cells do), so what's more likely to happen is you trip the
| protection on one of the cells being swapped. Fortunately these
| are not very high capacity nor current cells, being ~1000mAh at
| most. They seem to be pretty robust in general, as a series of
| hugely popular MP3/MP4 players that used them had nothing more
| than a diode from USB5V for charging.
|
| On the other hand, I'll gripe about that "schematic" being not
| actually a schematic but just loose parts with labeled pins.
| RF_Savage wrote:
| Barely more than a netlist.
| szundi wrote:
| What about having 2 diodes and problem solved
| jeden wrote:
| It has no solar panels , runs shorter than my cell phone on a
| single charge. It is thick. No ethernet socket Any small UMPC
| is better than this thing. I don't mercifully mention the blobs
| encapsulated in the raspberry pi itself.
| znpy wrote:
| It's got usb-2.0 ports though, you can get an usb-ethernet
| adapter if you want
| swiatlo wrote:
| for power?
| meefus wrote:
| I'm not understanding the appeal here. Why use this instead of
| a regular smartphone?
| rkagerer wrote:
| People often do this on their boat, but with 100Ah batteries
| and those rotary switches that select between "1, 2, BOTH".
|
| They don't realize how much current can flow if they slam it to
| "BOTH" when two batteries with very different voltages are
| connected.
| rogerpeters wrote:
| Are there any compact 4G/5G boards which can be plugged into this
| for outside connectivity? Last I looked, these breakout boards
| were far too cumbersome.
| oofbey wrote:
| I think connectivity would be a key challenge for this device.
| RPI zero2W only has WiFi4 == 802.11b/g/n. In a modern crowded
| building, 2.4GHz is often super crammed and busy, and I find
| wifi4 barely works. Lots of dropped packets, sometimes full
| seconds of latency.
| forinti wrote:
| It's nice, but I would use something with a bit more memory. An
| Orange Pi Zero 2W with 4GB maybe.
|
| 512MB nowadays is only practical if you don't use a GUI.
| mafuyu wrote:
| My pet peeve with RasPi for these types of handheld projects is
| that they don't support suspend, and don't have a true poweroff
| state. Even in poweroff, they sit there consuming a bunch of
| current.
|
| Beepy is a similar project that uses a RasPi Zero, and their
| approach is to cut power to the RasPi entirely with a management
| MCU. On my Beepy, I switched to a Radxa Zero instead and ported
| over any relevant kernel modules and device tree overlays,
| because it has an Amlogic SoC that actually supports suspend.
| boomskats wrote:
| Am I right in assuming it's fairly straightforward swap
| hardware wise? Do you have any measurements of the difference
| in battery drain between the two? Is it a fairly recent kernel?
|
| With that Sharp memory LCD and proper suspend that's
| potentially a gamechanger for the beepy. Any direction you can
| point me in appreciated.
| rcarmo wrote:
| Ditto. I've wanted to get a Beepy for a while, and I have a
| Radxa Zero already.
| swiatlo wrote:
| what is better? for ssh?
| mafuyu wrote:
| Hey, sorry for the late response. I posted my notes here:
| https://github.com/Hylian/beepy-radxa-zero-notes. It's a
| straight swap hardware-wise, and for software, you just need
| to build/install the kernel modules and configure some kernel
| boot arguments.
|
| Feel free to ask in the Discord if you have any questions.
| erohead wrote:
| I'd love to learn more! I'm one of the Beepy creators...I just
| emailed you
| jll29 wrote:
| I want my Blackberry back badly, and this project is giving me
| hope.
|
| The case it a bit too big, there are still battery issues, and of
| course a 5G card + microphone + loudspeaker need to be added.
|
| But perhaps the day will come that I can roll that wheel to view
| my emails again, use that excellent small keyboard to reply
| without having to touch glass.
| walterbell wrote:
| With some customization, Fairberry can fit a Blackberry
| keyboard on mobile phones with a USB port,
| https://liliputing.com/fairberry-lets-you-attach-a-blackberr...
| F7F7F7 wrote:
| I'm right there with you. The side scroll wheel on my 7520 was
| perfection. I could operate it from my pocket completely
| blindly.
|
| Punkt showed off a device that had me hopeful for awhile but it
| doesn't look like they are releasing it.
| jejeyyy77 wrote:
| nice!
| johnklos wrote:
| I'd love one of these!
|
| I just built a portable enclosure with a charge controller, USB
| hub, ethernet and four 18650 batteries. While The Hackberry Pi
| Zero would've been a lot easier (assuming I'd've just bought one
| instead of making it myself), the only downside is the battery
| life. My application is for having a server that travels with me
| and is on 100% of the time, sometimes running on battery for
| hours at a time.
|
| This, though, is so much smaller... It's definitely something to
| consider when they're shipping.
|
| Edit: just read, "Main Processor: Only compaticable with
| Raspberry pi zero 2w." I wonder why it's not compatible with the
| original Zero. Is it just that the drivers and preinstalled OS
| are 64 bit? Even though the 2W is more performant per watt, it
| still takes more absolute power. Hmmm.
| axelthegerman wrote:
| > My application is for having a server that travels with me
|
| You probably have your reasons but I wonder why anyone would
| need that
| rcarmo wrote:
| I have one, and it's very, very useful:
| https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2023/10/07/1830
| ianpenney wrote:
| See also: Lilygo Tdeck
|
| https://www.lilygo.cc/products/t-deck
|
| Runs meshtastic:
|
| https://meshtastic.org/
|
| The new UI is being developed right now...
|
| https://youtu.be/mtFwETD7nY4?feature=shared
| petschge wrote:
| If that thing had VGA-in on top of the keyboard and mouse out via
| USB, it would be a great tool to carry in a data center when you
| have to physically interact with a machine.
| rasz wrote:
| Plenty of commercial stuff that does just that. You can even
| buy dedicated network testers with this functionality.
|
| [The most useful networking tool I own - AliExpress "CCTV
| Tester" that does a lot more than test CCTV] Cameron Gray
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZQSkFl4yIM
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| > There is a red switch on the left side to decide if the
| keyboard controller communicates with the HackberryPi or with
| other device through the USBC-Port underneath.
|
| OK, having it be able to function as an emergency USB keyboard is
| pretty cool, though I think I'd prefer emulation of a USB device
| so I could run a sequence of commands, inject usernames and
| passwords for logins, etc.
| squarefoot wrote:
| FYI, there was a board named Hackberry over 10 years ago not
| related to the Raspberries. It employed the Allwinner A10 CPU and
| had WiFi on board, which was not common back in the day. It
| however lacked any exposed GPIO which made it unsuitable for
| hardware hacking, but had good audio (much much better than the
| RPis available back then) and decent overall performance. I still
| have one somewhere and recall using it both as webradio receiver
| for music and with SDR dongles using rtl_tcp. Later, smaller and
| better boards such as the NanoPi M1 turned out more useful for
| remote SDR applications.
|
| https://linux-sunxi.org/Miniand_Hackberry
| Havoc wrote:
| Is the keyboard original? The one on the q20 bb was great
| swayvil wrote:
| The keyboard is the weak link.
|
| We need a better voice to text. One that tunes into its user's
| voice perfectly without getting distracted. And that you can
| subvocalize at.
|
| An optimized spoken language for talking to phones too. Something
| harsh, insectile and dystopian.
| F7F7F7 wrote:
| The keyboard is the point.
| tempodox wrote:
| The name alone is ingenious. I'm completely enamored.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Back in the day, the Nokia N770/N810/N900 line fit the bill for
| this perfectly. Its form factor was perfect for the "Linux
| terminal in your pocket" use case.
|
| Might be something to look into for design inspiration.
| nextos wrote:
| I miss them so much. Even the N9, which lacked a physical
| keyboard, was so nice. A planned N9 variant with a sliding
| keyboard was never released once the series was discontinued.
|
| It was so refreshing to have a mobile that acted as a regular
| Linux machine. You could copy files from your other computers
| normally just using scp.
|
| Or tweak the GSM radio, as you would do with any other device,
| just using ifconfig.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| I wonder why the two switch system was necessary. Would an auto
| switch when an external keyboard is plugged in require something
| that would drain resources like a hardware listener?
| szundi wrote:
| I love these gadgets
| jeden wrote:
| Such computers are cool, but fat and inconvenient. I don't
| understand why decent companies like ibm, samsung or others won't
| make a Linux handheld seriously. With a good processor that will
| be power efficient and run for a long time on a single charge.
|
| Terminal and ssh will suffice in many cases. People a lot of time
| used only terminal and live.
| techn00 wrote:
| Because there's no money to be made from such devices
| walterbell wrote:
| 2023 Pixel tablet can run GrapheneOS and supports Android
| Virtualization Framework (pKVM) for real Linux VMs alongside
| Android.
| znpy wrote:
| I wonder if selling this as a kit with parts to solder and
| assemble would make it easier to sell more of these.
| RecycledEle wrote:
| I wish someone would make a 5" to 7" clamshell "laptop" that runs
| a Linux command line and lasts forever on an internal lithium (or
| replaceable AA) battery.
|
| I want the retro feel of mini laptops back when GUIs were only on
| $20k UNIX workstations.
| abawany wrote:
| I have a MNT Pocket Reform on order just for this reason. I
| recently sold a Sony PGH (~2009 model) that still ran modern
| Debian just fine as I'm expecting to get my order soon. Edit: I
| also bought a broken HP 95LX so I could replace its innards
| with a RPi Zero 2w and a screen but I haven't made progress on
| that yet.
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