Raspberry Pi Forums

Hi all

I currently have a Pi set up as a media centre. The case is an old freeview box. This works well enoug, but a lot of space is taken up with connectors and adapters, and the positioning is tricky and messy to get access to the network and USB connectors.

So here are my plans for this Pi (a rev1) when I get a new one (in the next few months). I just want to sound it out here before I go ahead, and ask some questions.

First off, using uUSB for power is inconvenient. It blocks access to the SD card. Now I don't intend to be taking the card out very often, but it would be nice to be able to do so easily. How safe is it to supply power directly to the 5V GPIO pins? IIRC it bypasses some protection circuitry, but is anyone else doing so?

Next thing is the SD card itself. It sticks out a long way. Does anyone know of any way round this? For example, a shortened micro SD adapter or similar?

Now we get to the more advanced bits. The biggest problems with my setup are the composite and audio connectors. How difficult would it be to remove these connectors from the Pi and put pin headers (or similar) in place? I have plenty of soldering & desoldering experience, but have never dealt with something like the Pi, specifically with it being multi-layered. I currently use a SCART connector for AV, and would like to connect them directly to the board.

Finally, I would like to do the same with the USB and network ports. This would allow improved mounting options. The Pi could go anywhere in the case, and I could just add my required connectors where I want.

I kind of wish the Pi had been made like this from the start. If pin headers were used initially, and adapters supplied to sit on them, it would be much better for my purposes. This would be my biggest feature request, before even gigabit ethernet. I do understand it probably wouldn't fit with the intended purpose of the Pi, and would probably increase the cost, too.

Anyway, any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

drmouse wrote:Next thing is the SD card itself. It sticks out a long way. Does anyone know of any way round this? For example, a shortened micro SD adapter or similar?

Have a look at these:
https://www.modmypi.com/shop/sd-cards-a ... rd-adaptor
http://www.adafruit.com/products/966

Using the GPIO 5volt+ground pins is possible but there's no F3 polyfuse protection if anything bad should happen there's no current protection for your PI.

As for removing the composite and headphone socket this should be fairly easy with a solder sucker or desoldering wick / braid.
If you find the solder joints are not losing up you may need to apply extra solder to get things flowing.

Richard S.

drmouse wrote:Finally, I would like to do the same with the USB and network ports. This would allow improved mounting options. The Pi could go anywhere in the case, and I could just add my required connectors where I want.

Note that the RasPi ethernet jack has integrated magnetics for isolation. Unless you can remove the RasPi ethernet jack intact & reuse it, be sure to either add separate magnetics or get a similar jack with it integrated.
If you happen to have or can find an old / dead router you could salvage a few ethernet transformer (magnetics) chips.

Let us know how it goes. I've been thinking of removing connectors too.

I've used this method for removing parts intact from other pcbs. On the RasPi a soldering iron tip could lay across all 8 ethernet pins at once & you could just cut one or bothmounting pins topside to make things easier.

(missed the post edit cut off)

Ive already pulled the composite vid off mine, takes a little persuasion but it will come out!
Can't say on the audio or USB/ethernet, probably what the other poster said.

Good luck and keep us updated!!

Wolf

Cheers for all the suggestions.

I'm not going to be doing this until I get a new Pi. I'm just getting info for the moment to help me decide whether to do this. From your suggestions, it looks like this is all doable.

I'll keep you all updated when I get around to doing this.

Thanks again