Raspberry Pi Zero gains a camera connector

The Raspberry Pi Zero has added a camera connector. Chief Pi guy Eben Upton has explained that the new connector came about as a result of colossal demand for the minuscule computer. The factory baking Pis could not keep up with demand for the Zero and then had to pause production once the Raspberry Pi 3 debuted. Upton says …

[ZSn]

expensive

I have already ordered my zero v3 and look forward to playing with it. However I didn't order the cable because it is the same price as the zero. Frankly ridiculous for a simple flex. I have an old raspberry pi 1 that can do that for free. I would have preferred it if they had put on another usb or even a lan/WiFi connector. I would pay extra for that option for sure.

[Phil Kingston]

Re: expensive

Yep, a second NIC and I'd be all over trying one as a firewall.

[Voland's right hand]

Re: expensive

Expensive and _USELESS_.

The v4l2 drivers for the built in cameras are presently broken across the board. I found this to my great displeasure this weekend when assembling two new "house control" Pis - one for my summer house and one for my workshop.

So running anything like motion is out of the question. You can sort'a use some of the utilities that the Pi foundation rebadges out of the broadcom refence toolkit, but that means no motion detection, no off-the shelf video streaming, etc.

So, if you need a camera, just get a good quality USB module - ELP on amazon ships some (with pluggable IR interfaces, different optics, etc). This also solves a lot of issues with cabling and enclosures as a USB is much easier to protect than a flat cable.

That is what I ended up doing as I actually need the at least some of my Pis to double as CCTVs. The built in cameras are now back in the spare parts drawer.

[Chemist]

Re: expensive

"So running anything like motion is out of the question."

Strange then that I've had it running for weeks on two Pis ( a Pi 2 and P 3) with the 'built-in' cameras. Just need the bcm2835_v4l2 module to use motion.

Lots of info around

try :http://www.richardmudhar.com/blog/2015/02/raspberry-pi-camera-and-motion-out-of-the-box-sparrowcam/

[Robin]

Re: expensive

@Chemist: Interesting blog! I'll read it again properly when I've woken up. Is the feed online anywhere? Would be cool to watch.

[Chemist]

Re: expensive

" Is the feed online anywhere? Would be cool to watch."

No idea I'm afraid. I found it when I was new to Pi and wanted to get motion working ( amid a sea of out-of-date info BTW)

[Ogi]

Re: expensive

> Strange then that I've had it running for weeks on two Pis ( a Pi 2 and P 3) with the 'built-in' cameras. Just need the bcm2835_v4l2 module to use motion.

Indeed, one of the first things I did when the original Pi came out was buy the Pi camera, install motion and have it monitor my car to find out who was vandalising it. It is still going strong, but is now a rasbpi3 instead.

As parent mentioned, the Internet is full of people using the Pi as a cheap CCTV system.

As for my new project ideas, I am looking into seeing how good a RasbPi camera is for astrophotography. Currently doing reference shots and getting the software written for long exposure RAW image capture, then fetching of images via the network to my processing box. After that will look into active cooling to reduce thermal noise.

I am also thinking of replacing my Mini-ITX firewall with the rasbpi2 (alas, the 3 doesn't support FreeBSD yet). Does anyone know how good the pi2 is with three USB/ethernet adaptors? Ideally what kind of throughput (and number of connections) can it handle as I do get around 50mbit/sec on my broadband, and quite a lot of connections.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: expensive

Just use an old Raspbian distro. VLC works in the old version I still use for my remote webcam.

[James Hughes 1]

Re: expensive

USB webcams are slower and usually lower image quality. They take up a lot of CPU time (vs the built in ISP which uses none), and cannot easily use the built in H264 encoder.

Also often more expensive.

I'd always recommend going with the Pi camera. There are ways around any issues with V4L2, although I believe that is currently undergoing some development to improve it anyway.

[Dave Stevenson]

Re: expensive

Lovely rant. However I haven't noticed anyone post on the forums about V4L2 being broken. On the odd occasion when things do get broken they are then it generally gets fixed PDQ.

Details please as I'm not a mind reader.

(Volunteer Pi support for camera stuff)

[Herby]

Prophecy coming true.

A person of "great influence" mentioned to me a long time ago that the computer would become "just a bump" in the power cord. Devices like this indicate it coming true.

Of course in those days, the power cord was to an ASR33 teletype, but it still holds true today.

[Haku]

Re: Prophecy coming true.

It has already begun, so to speak.

The top end RGB LED strips have lots of microcontrollers on the cable so each LED can be an individual colour, allowing creative people to do things like this.

[John Robson]

Damn

Now I need another PiZero....

[werdsmith]

Re: Damn

Still available in bundle kits, all the board only £4 ones sold out though.

[DropBear]

" I have tons of ideas for the new #PiZero."

"...like IoT home security camera, IoT bird feeder camera, IoT home security camera with bird feeder view, IoT bird feeder camera with home security functions, erm... wait, I got this..."

[Dwarf]

Still out of stock

Still not in stock according to CPC.

It would be nice to have one of these with 1Gb of RAM

These look Ideal for a number of things I've got on the go (remote programmers for Arduino's, local user interfaces etc. Mine will end up with a 90 degree header so it will take no space on the main PCB's

[werdsmith]

Re: Still out of stock

CPC don't sell these. In UK only 2 online retailers are selling them.

CPC (Farnell/Element14) and RS weren't interested in the Zero due to low profit and 1 per customer ordering requirement.

[James Hughes 1]

Production is now ongoing, so there should be batches of many thousands arriving at distributors every week.

As for 'why doesn't it have this feature that is absolutely essential" comments.

It's $5. ANY additional features are going to add a large percentage to that price. So you end up with either the CM, the A+ or the Pi3. That's called a 'range' of products. A range of features and a range of prices. Even the most expensive is only $35. Just use the one that fits the job best, and pay for it.

[Anonymous Coward]

"It's $5. ANY additional features are going to add a large percentage to that price."

Yet adding a camera connector did not push the price up.

[YARR]

Is the Pi zero board layout published under an open licence? If the components are all off-the-shelf, what's to stop anyone making compatible variants with ethernet / wifi / 1Gb RAM / extra or full-size USB / HDMI ports etc?

[Dadmin]

Of course it didn't. The cost of making it pin-compatible at the edge of the card is hardly noticeable over the full run of the project, and I think the supporting hardware is already on the SoC, so that made it dead simple. The connector? Pennies per dozen in bulk. The cost is in the cable and the camera, which is totally optional, and looks to be compatible with the normal Pi camera. Not so with extra USB, or Ethernet, if that's what you're on about. For the low-low price, it's a great value. Otherwise, buy the bigger Pi 2/3 and strap on anything missing.

I have to complete my experiments with my GPIO kits soon, my last Pi project; Kodi/XBMC players in multiple rooms all connecting back to a Pi/NFS/timeserver that holds all their content was a total success. It even brought everything back online after a power outage yesterday. The only thing it needed was the vfat.fsck, which I should really handle with some light automation inside the startup script framework. And having a local timeserver is so much more efficient than making all 7 or 8 of my Pi systems individually ask for time services from the outside world. What can't these things do? Other than cost more than $200 for a similar solution from most other kit.

[Vincent Ballard]

Or with the C.H.I.P. One USB port (not including power in) and wifi would be sufficient for my DLSR-controller project. I'm going to do it with a Pi3, but a Zero+Wifi would be perfect if it existed.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

renaming?

It's not very "zero" if they're adding features. I propose renaming it Pi Epsilon.

[Goatshadow]

Zero Case

Now someone needs to sell a camera case for the Zero. The available cases for it at any rate are pretty dire. (And not all of us have a 3D printer to make our own)

[Francis Boyle]

Why not

get one printed at one of the online 3D printing outlets? 20-30 USD should cover it.