Raspberry Pi has PCBs for 100 beta $25 PCs

http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/raspberry-pi-has-pcbs-for-100-beta-25-pcs-2011121/

by ukdm • 15 years ago

42 20 15 years ago

This is a solid step in proving that the project isn't just a dream and isn't vaporware. Although I wonder why a plain board would be ordered, when it looks to be all very small SMT components that a hobbyist would have a difficult time with anyway?

lgeek• 15 years ago

They won't be selling unpopulated PCBs, only assembled boards.

retroafroman2• 15 years ago

Right, but on the blog post they say they'll offer a few to the community most likely. 100 seems a little excessive for a board test batch, but maybe it was the smallest order number they could get.

sliverstorm4• 15 years ago

A determined hobbyist can handle that stuff. As I understand, the only thing that really stops a determined hobbyist is BGA.

Which, actually, might be exactly what the square in the middle is. In which case they certainly will not be marketing bare boards.

shabble• 15 years ago

Some BGAs are possible with the right size shims and a hot-air gun (even a cheap £20 gas iron with hot-air tip has worked in the past).

Debugging/QA is utterly impossible though (since it generally involves x-rays), so if it doesn't work, you get to start over.

gravitronic2• 15 years ago

Exciting!

I guess the proceeds of the auction will help them scale?

Even with support from Broadcom I'm sure at $25/piece there's not a lot of room for paying off their fixed costs.

polshaw2• 15 years ago

It's also helpful that one of the guys involved owns a PCB manufacturer!

Rinum• 15 years ago

Additionally, it looks like they won't sell boards (post-beta) until sometime early next year.

Source: http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/389#comment-5402

"I don’t think, sadly, that you’re going to be able to give them away as Christmas gifts this year. We will, however, be making as many of these as we can sell (not just 10k) in the new year, so I suggest you get planning for birthdays, anniversaries and wedding presents!"

aespinoza2• 15 years ago

Yes this is indeed very disappointing. I guess I might have misunderstood most of the blog posts when they said they would be releasing by the end of this year, and that the prices were set to $25 and $35. So I guess we all have to wait for next year.

gravitronic2• 15 years ago

A couple month slips is pretty typical, especially for a project that is everyone's 'side-project' and not day job.

I'm happier with their open communication instead of having built it in private and released it suddenly one day.

sireat• 15 years ago

Unfortunately, my predictions have come true, volume availability of Pi will not happen this year.

At least we can take solace at the fact that the delays are unlikely to be as bad as with Pandora console.

Raspberry Pi has PCBs for 100 beta $25 PCs

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