Unofficial Raspberry Pi kits to be made availabne.

[boarsblood]

Okay, in order to answer demands from slashdot for a DIY Raspberry Pi, I'm going to be producing a limited number of kits.

It'll work like this; as soon as the R-Pi is released I'll be purchasing units to match demand, and disassembling them. Of course, I won't be using some closed source Reflow Oven. Oh no, I'll be using good old fashioned open source fire!

Once the boards are thoroughly heat soaked, by hanging them off a toasting fork in in front of the log fire in my lounge, I'll slowly move them closer to the flame until all the components fall off. I plan to catch them in shovel I use for cleaning out the grate ...Hmm, I may have to prise the SoC from the memory with a butter knife... Then it's a simple procedure to put all the parts in a baggie and post then to the lucky buyer, who'll then have hours of fun followed by the satisfaction of having assembled his own R-Pi.

I'll also be offering a special Slashdot TOSSEER kit (Total Open Source Stuff Everything Else Removed). I'm sure this unique offering will be very popular as it will only include parts for which sources are available. Obviously the first casualty will be the Broadcom BCM2835 with it's nasty closed source proprietary design going against the spirit if the open source community.

Now, some might say that not having a CPU or GPU will limit the immediate usefulness of the completed kit, of what will come to be known as the Raspberry Wi (rhymes with "why?"), but that's exactly the kind of challenge us real hard core hackers all like, right? The kit won't come with any re-assembly instructions but there are loads of people on-line that claim to be able to solder BGA chips in a microwave, or something, so it should be simple.

Anyway, I won't be taking pre-orders but I expect this to fly out of the door (followed by a string of expletives as I burn my fingers trying to pick hot surface mount resistors off a shovel).

Needless to say, these customised after-market R-Wi kits will come with absolutely no warranty and no refund due to my unique made-to-order service.

Regards

BB

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See, this is what happens when we're left waiting so long.

[Allan]

This sounds AWESOME!!!!!!! wen can i get 1?

[tufty]

r u takin preordrs?

[abishur]

Oh the horror

[Jongoleur]

Definitely a HOT announcement!  D'you think it'll become vaporware if you leave it in your OSRO too long?

And what's the mark-up?

11+2   Heheheheheheheheheheheheeeeeeeeeeeeee

Edit: Acronym Refinement

[boarsblood]

tufty said:


r u takin preordrs?



N nt tkn preRdrs!

-----------

The Raspberry Wi Fundation is an unregistered non-product making organisation.

[boarsblood]

Jongoleur said:


Definitely a HOT announcement!  D"you think it"ll become vaporware if you leave it in your OSRO too long?


OSRO, I like it. As it's a log fire it's actually a carbon-neutral OSRO

[bredman]

To remove any unwanted closed-source software from the SD card, I recommend cleaning it in your washing machine, a 90-degree wash should do the job.

[liz]

I have no words, BB. Brilliant. Thank you for cheering up my evening!

[n3tw0rk5]

I can see there being a very high demand for this quality hand melted product, sales may reach as high as five.

Wired must be waiting to interview you, allthough they may request that the fire is lit at their convenience.

I think the rest of us mere mortals will have to wait for the next batch.

[tufty]

boarsblood said:


tufty said:


r u takin preordrs?


N nt tkn preRdrs!


bumr! wen u relesin? is it redi?

[spamel]

I think it is cheating to have the original board to solder onto.  Send a bit of old cornflakes pack and some tin foil for them to create their own board with, the cheating lazy want-it-alls!

[n3tw0rk5]

Does it come in brown?

[jojopi]

OP is a troll, albeit one currying favour.  Better threads than this have been locked.

[Luny]

I've managed to created a piece of software that can work a CPU so hard it will burn it off the board. Would you like a copy?

[liz]

jojopi said:


OP is a troll, albeit one currying favour.  Better threads than this have been locked.


The OP's…OP is a joke, Jojopi, and it's a very good one, at that. We like levity round here. That and the smell of exploding capacitors.

[meltwater]

Cooking a Pi on a fire....that is a shooting offence!

I'm going to write to my MP and start an ePetition, won't somebody think of the Pi's...

[PiOfCube]

Can I have mine totally encased in Lucite please?

That way it will never get damaged, scratched or fried when I accidentally connect a bad power supply to it and pump 240v into the board.

[Lynbarn]

meltwater said:


Cooking a Pi on a fire....that is a shooting offence!

I'm going to write to my MP and start an ePetition, won't somebody think of the Pi's...



or, as John Lennon once said (and indeed, sang):

"All we are saying, is give 'Pi's a chance..."

[ukscone]

Lynbarn said:





or, as John Lennon once said (and indeed, sang):

"All we are saying, is give 'Pi's a chance..."


that works best in a foreign accent.

[which country/accent was it where  PIe sounds like PIss ? dutch or was it one of the scandinavian ones?]

[ukscone]

That kit is too easy. real men's Raspberry Pi kits would be 10 tonne of builder's sand, 100 tonne of charcoal, some Malachite, a box of matches and some other odds and sods

[TheEponymousBob]

ukscone said:
That kit is too easy. real men"s Raspberry Pi kits would be 10 tonne of builder"s sand, 100 tonne of charcoal, some Malachite, a box of matches and some other odds and sods

Meh—just give me a whole lotta hydrogen and a few billion years to play with…

[JustThisGuy]

I'd buy one! But only if you go the extra step and de-laminate the board into layers. Oh, and don't label the trace layers, let me guess. In fact, could you cut the traces up into short bits, I love a good puzzle.

Why, when I was a DIY'er we'd go down to the local fab plant and ask for leftover PCBs with faults! And no documents either!

On second thought, keep the kit and the PCB and just send me a text description of the CPU die. I'll take it from there.

[Chromatix]

ukscone said:


Lynbarn said:





or, as John Lennon once said (and indeed, sang):

"All we are saying, is give 'Pi's a chance..."


that works best in a foreign accent.

[which country/accent was it where  PIe sounds like PIss ? dutch or was it one of the scandinavian ones?]


Finnish probably counts here.  Each of the eight native and one borrowed vowels has a direct mapping to a letter, some of which involve umlauts.  So to make "pie" sound as in English, you have to write "pai".

Amusing trivia: Finnish has a direct equivalent to the English "Olde", namely "wanha".  It sounds identical to the proper spelling "vanha", but simply uses an obsolete letter.  Several of the consonants are simply not used in Finnish, except occasionally in loanwords.

[Jessie]

TOSSEER... I love it.