Feasibility of ports/ addons for the MintyPi?

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Womsk
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Feasibility of ports/ addons for the MintyPi?

Post by Womsk » Sat Dec 02, 2017 5:15 am

Hi everybody! I am currently waiting for my MintyPi parts to come soon and I was wondering about the possibility of adding now features to the MintyPi. Firstly - would it be possible to add a removable SD card, another Micro USB port and a headphone jack? Could I just a removable SD card. Also - the camera connector is still there - could the MintyPi have a camera? Finally, can you run raspbian Linux on a raspberry pi, allowing many more features like web browsing, reading E Books and even playing Pico-8 games? Thanks!

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dryja123
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Re: Feasibility of ports/ addons for the MintyPi?

Post by dryja123 » Sat Dec 02, 2017 6:03 am

Nothing is impossible but there's absolutely zero room inside of that Altoids tin.

In order to get the micro USB to work for other functions you'll need a USB hub or an Atmega32u4.

Headphone jack is possible but extremely tricky. Another user posed a guide and had to do serious rearranging.

SD card extender is possible but hasn't been achieved yet because how hard it is to work in the tin.

You're going to have to forget about that Pi camera. There's no room for the ribbon or the camera.

I would suggest on buying an Altoids tin and picturing how you're going to get a battery, sound card, charging board, button PCB, L1 / R1 buttons, Pi, Screen, 3d printer parts, and a tangle of wires. Then you'll have to consider all of the extras you wanted in there. As you're holding that tin in your hand you'll realize that it's incredibly tiny.

I hope I'm not being dismissive to your aspirations for the mintyPi. I'm just trying to set realistic expectations given from someone who's built a bunch of them. Give your suggestions a go and post back your results.

CPLSeraphim
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Re: Feasibility of ports/ addons for the MintyPi?

Post by CPLSeraphim » Sat Dec 02, 2017 7:42 am

Womsk wrote:
Sat Dec 02, 2017 5:15 am
.... Finally, can you run raspbian Linux on a raspberry pi, allowing many more features like web browsing, reading E Books and even playing Pico-8 games? Thanks!
BerryBoot is a bootloader that allows multiple OS. It can download some OS's that are slimmed down, or make you own. Some OS cant be made into one, like the Outernet OS can't be slimmed. However they have versions of retropie and debian and a bunch of stuff.

Womsk
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Re: Feasibility of ports/ addons for the MintyPi?

Post by Womsk » Sun Dec 03, 2017 1:02 pm

dryja123 wrote:
Sat Dec 02, 2017 6:03 am
Nothing is impossible but there's absolutely zero room inside of that Altoids tin.

In order to get the micro USB to work for other functions you'll need a USB hub or an Atmega32u4.

Headphone jack is possible but extremely tricky. Another user posed a guide and had to do serious rearranging.

SD card extender is possible but hasn't been achieved yet because how hard it is to work in the tin.

You're going to have to forget about that Pi camera. There's no room for the ribbon or the camera.

I would suggest on buying an Altoids tin and picturing how you're going to get a battery, sound card, charging board, button PCB, L1 / R1 buttons, Pi, Screen, 3d printer parts, and a tangle of wires. Then you'll have to consider all of the extras you wanted in there. As you're holding that tin in your hand you'll realize that it's incredibly tiny.

I hope I'm not being dismissive to your aspirations for the mintyPi. I'm just trying to set realistic expectations given from someone who's built a bunch of them. Give your suggestions a go and post back your results.
How would an Atmega32u4 add an extra USB port? Also - do you know of any good USB hubs?
Thanks! :D

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