Add-Ons For Raspberry Pi That You Should Know About

You didn't buy a Raspberry Pi to simply show it. You would want to make the best use of it, won't you? 

Since its launch, the open source board Raspberry Pi has proved to be a godsend. There have been tons of uses found for the device. Moreover, there have been thousands of add-ons created for it. Some of these, though amazing and very useful, are lesser known. Here are 10 such lesser known ones.

1. Jason Barnett's MotorPiTX board

This is an integrated servo or motor board and integrated power supply for Raspberry Pi. You can use it for various projects, like building your own robots/.

2. Cosma Pabouctsidis Smart IO Expansion Card

Here you will find a smart I/O card that can be stacked on top of a single board Raspberry Pi computer.

3. Pi Supply's Fish Dish

This is an add-on board for your Raspberry Pi that lets you add three LEDs, a switch and a buzzer to it.

4. Pi Supply's Pi Crust (Mounted on Pi)

Want to make your Raspberry Pi easier to connect with other electronics? This is the board to go for.

5. GeekRoo's Fairywren Mini-ITX Motherboard

If this list were set in the order of preference then this add-on would be at the top of the list. It allows you to turn your Raspberry Pi into somewhat of a CPU hub, making it a full-fledged computer.

6. Grasping Hand's SweetBox, Heatsinks & ScorPi

Sweetbox is the smallest case for your Raspberry Pi, while Scorpi is a camera board holder.

7. MausBerry Circuits' Power Supply Ignition Switch

Did you know about this one? This is a car power supply for Raspberry Pi. It is capable of sensing the ignition and then shutting down the Pi safely.

8. Ciseco's Pi Light Bright White LED Display

This one has a series of white LEDs, which can work as a variety of things. These include being a marquee that scrolls for weather information, Twitter feed etc. In addition, it is also capable of displaying static information, like time etc.

9. OpenElectronics' Pi-Pan Tilt Kit

This one provides tilt and Pan movements for your Raspberry Pi-based camera. You can use this add-on to pan the camera from left to right, which means at an angle as big as 180 degres.

10. Alex Eames's HDMIPi HD Screen Prototypes

This is an effort at creating an HDMI screen that is not of sub-standard quality and neither are they expensive. It creates a small HDMI screen using the Raspberry Pi.

Author: Shivam Kotwalia, CodeKill

Raspberry Pi Projects That Will Blow Your Mind

Raspberry Pi can be used to do some pretty amazing things. Here are some of the best that have been done.

Raspberry Pi, the tiny open source computer, is a neat little device. It has been used by many users to build innovative microcomputers that can come in handy for a variety of purposes. Here are some of the best models that we saw.

1. Build a Nice-Looking Cardboard Raspberry Pi Case

Being a completely stripped down device, you need to build a case for your Raspberry Pi board. You can either build the case or buy one.

2. Build a Raspberry Pi-Powered Computer

You can make an entire computer that is powered by Raspberry Pi. This includes simple and easy to make machines to full all-in-one desktops.

3. Set Up a Personal Web Server

If you’re good with programming then you can use a Raspberry Pi to build you own web server. It won’t be able to deal with major traffic, but you can use it for various other purposes, like hosting a small file sharing network for free.

4. Raspberry Pi Home Automation

Raspberry Pi boards have been used for home automation in multiple innovations by users all around the world.

5. Make a Solar-Powered Raspberry Pi

You can also utilise solar power for running your Rapberry Pi. It makes for a very good DIY option.

6. Camera Pi – DSLR Camera with Embedded Computer

How about installing a computer in a DSLR Camera? Raspberry Pi gives you the power to do it.

7. Use a Raspberry Pi to Automate Time-Lapse Photos

This is an instructable that teaches you how to build a time-lapse dolly using the Raspberry Pi.

8. Hack a Kindle Into a Minimal Computer with a Raspberry Pi

Did you know you could use the Kindle as a monitor for your Raspberry Pi unit? All you need is a keyboard, some USB cables, the Kindle and the Pi.

9. Build an Automatic DeviantArt Picture Frame

You can build a photo frame that is powered by the Raspberry Pi. This allows you to download and put up a slideshow of pictures from Deviant Art.

10. Build a Raspberry Pi-Powered MAME Arcade Table

In this project, the Pi has been used in order to build a slimline version of the arcade cocktail cabinet. You can also use the cabinet to browser the internet, write emails etc.

11. Build a Virtual Analogue Synthesizer Using Raspberry Pi

This comes from one of the members of the Raspberry Pi Foundation forums. The member, Omenie, was working on a synthesizer using the Rapberry Pi microcomputer.

12. Raspberry PI in a Game Boy Case

Want handheld PC for yourself? All you need to do is put in a Raspberry Pi computer within the old school Nintendo Game Boy.

Author : Shivam Kotwalia, CodeKill