Did you get a Raspberry Pi Zero?

We gave away something free with our magazine, The MagPi, yesterday.

MagPi issue 40 in all its glory

Who’s a pretty boy, then?

The magazine industry has a concept called “technical sellout”, where more than 80% of copies are bought.

You swarmed over UK newsagents and achieved that with The MagPi in less than 12 hours. As far as we know, the last time that happened was with the female version of Playboy in the 1970s. So, as Carrie Anne says, we’ve served up a victory for gender equality, and a free computer.

You’ll find a map of all the places carrying the MagPi in the UK and Ireland on the MagPi website – there are still a few copies out there, so it might be worth your while ringing the outlets closest to you to see if they still have stock.

Clive's Goblin Tinkerer

Clive’s Goblin Tinkerer

If you’re in Ireland or Northern Ireland: it appears there was a bit of a SNAFU yesterday. MagPis were meant to be going into Tesco stores across both Ireland and Northern Ireland, but the tills hadn’t been programmed correctly (this was the first month they were carrying the MagPi, and we think a crucial button didn’t get pressed), so the magazine didn’t scan. Tesco’s response was to order shops to return all the magazines to the warehouse.

We’re talking to the distributors now, and we heard ten minutes ago that the magazines will be going back to the stores at the start of next week. Keep an eye on our Twitter feed and Facebook – we’ll let you know as soon as we hear they’ve hit the ground, so you can all go and do the swarm of locusts thing at your local Tesco.

If you’re in the United States: At the time of writing, Micro Center still has stock of the Zero itself, at $5. You can reserve online but you’ll have to visit a store in person: while we’re still in shortage they’re not selling online. We think all other online outlets are sold out now. The magazine with a free Zero on the cover will land in Barnes&Noble and Micro Center in about three weeks. (We print in the UK and ocean freight the magazine to the USA to keep costs down, which takes a little while.) Again, we’ll let you know on Twitter and Facebook, and we’ll make sure that there’s a note at the top of the blog here on the day as well.

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Wherever you are in the world: you can still get your hands on Issue 40 with the free Raspberry Pi Zero if you subscribe (you’ll also get a free cable bundle). We’re waiting on a second print run at the moment for subscribers only; if you’d like to get your hands on one, you can find out how to subscribe at the MagPi website. Subs to the physical magazine start at just £12.99.

We’ve been enjoying seeing what the community’s been getting up to with their Pi Zeros.

This was unquestionably the best tweet of the day:

And watching you all on Twitter has been an absolute blast:

 

 

 

Some of you have started incorporating the Zero into builds already.

Meanwhile, even though Pi Zero has only been out for a day, add-on boards and cases are already appearing in the wild. Here’s Pimoroni’s gorgeous PiBow Zero case:

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Considerably larger than actual size

They’re also making a range of what they’re calling pHATs – not true HATs (no EEPROM), but teeny add-ons for the Pi Zero, like this very pretty scrolling LED beast, which is £10:

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You’ll find more pHATs (including a DAC) and other accessories at Pimoroni.

Adafruit have made an impossibly inexpensive, and awfully cute, little Zero Protector for only $3.95. The only Zeros they have left at the moment are in more expensive bundles with accessories, but we hope they’ll be getting some more in soon.

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C4Labs in the USA have a BEAUTIFUL little wooden case (my favourite case so far), and a very nifty wooden prototyping setup available to buy. The Zebra Zero case is $4.99, and Zebra Zero Plus! prototyping kit is $9.99

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The folks from Bare Conductive, who do amazing things with capacitive touch, are already working on the Touch Board Pi Cap, which we’re really excited about – it’ll be available very soon, and will turn your Zero into a polyphonic music maker (just add bananas), empower you to turn all kinds of things around the house into buttons and switches, and much more. You can learn more over at Bare Conductive.

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In answer to a frequently asked question: yes, we will continue to make Zeros for as long as you guys want them. It looks like demand will continue to outstrip supply for a while if yesterday’s rush is anything to go by, but we’re doing our very best to keep channels open, and we advise you not to buy from scalpers on eBay, because…karma. The Pi Hut and Pimoroni in the UK, and Adafruit in the US should be restocking soon, so keep an eye on them.

If you’re doing something fun with a Zero, please let us know – we’d love to feature you here or in the MagPi!