Raspberry Pi console case

[oninoshiko]

There has been a few comparisons to some of the gaming consoles, even some talk of using the Raspi as one. So, I got to thinking, "would would be a nice way to do that?"

So, here are my thoughts:


Plastic top
Raspi, SD card facing "front,"

short HDMI extension to route HDMI to the "back" 
short Ethernet extension to back
R-angle micro USB going back and down. (power)
1 USB going down

routed out Plastic sides and bottom
7-port powered USB hub

1 USB port removed and other end of micro-USB soldered on
"computer side" port removed and other end of full-sized USB soldered on

routed out Plastic sides and bottom

In each corner there would be a screw-hole to keep the entire stack together, and it would all be made to fit snugly. 6 ports should be plenty for attaching controllers and USB sticks (for saved games). The SD card would effectively be a cartridge.

Thoughts?

[abishur]

My only thought is that you're gonna hit a snag with the micro-usb power and the SD card slot.  I don't think you'll have enough space to get an adapter on the power port to route it backwards and still have easy access to the SD card slot.  I suppose you could set it back far enough, but then you'd be risking dropping the card in the case every time you removed and attempted to reinsert the SD card.

[plugwash]

mmm, if you want a front facing SD card slot then it's probablly better to ignore the micro USB power connector and power the Pi through the GPIO header

[oninoshiko]

I do admit, the front facing SD slot *IS* something I have my heart set on. Without that, I have to rip apart the entire case every time I want to swap them.

Will connecting the Vcc and GND pins on the Raspi's GPIO to the same USB pins work? I don't see why not, but I defer to the more EE types.

I was trying to avoid modifing the Raspi itself, as I understand it the GPIO will not have a header attached. Maybe I could make part of the case on either side stick out slightly to give more room? I might have to wait until I get one and see how it will work.

[S0litaire]

Why not just have an indent/cutout and give room in front if the case to use a right angled Micro USB to feed round the back of the board.

[oninoshiko]

S0litaire said:


Why not just have an indent/cutout and give room in front if the case to use a right angled Micro USB to feed round the back of the board.


I think maybe you put better what I had in mind.

[MetabolicCloth]

you could also get a panel mount sd card extension cord

[archsaddler]

MetabolicCloth said:


you could also get a panel mount sd card extension cord



Any sources for these ?

[MetabolicCloth]

HDMI -

http://www.startech.com/Cables.....HDMIPNLFM3

Ethernet -

http://www.datapro.net/product.....ernet.html

heres 2 quick examples

[archsaddler]

No for the   "panel mount sd card extension"   i've found extension cables for sd card but no panel mount .

[archsaddler]

Duplicate post .

[oninoshiko]

Well, still gotta wait on the next batch. Such is life!

Nice panel-mount extention! I didn't even think to look for that! (Ideas like that are exactly why I posted here, so thanks!)

The network, I figured I'd just hack an extention together, but at that price, why bother?

I still want to try to mount it so the actual cardslot is accessable, but if I went with a extention for the slot, that woul protect the board even more! I might like this idea...

Archsaddler: Here is what I found. Searching for SD stuff is hard because you get alot of things in "South Dakota"

http://www.ec21.com/product-de.....62035.html

That helps out a lot, but that's why I posted this. I figured you guys would think of things I wouldn't!

[ceramicsaturn]

Forgive me for not understanding, but just curious; what use would having the SD card in the front be? The SD card slot is simply for OS, not for storage (where you'd put your rom). Unless I'm not fully understanding how the hardware will work...

[SN]

If you only want to extend the sd card slot out an inch or so you can use a microSD to SD adaptor and plug it in an SD to microSD adaptor.
The former are a bit rare but the latter are 10-a-penny and you generally get one with each microSD card

[gadgetoid]

I'd leave the internal SD card in-situ as a boot partition and use a separate, USB-connected SD reader for ROMs and games.

It strikes me that the PND system and Minimenu front ends built for OpenPandora would be awesome on a Pi console.

I'm planning on attempting to do something with the Retrode 2 and Pi.

A powerful enough USB hub situated inside should surely be able to power the Pi itself? It would also obviously supply ports for USB game controllers, bluetooth/wifi dongles, memory card readers or USB mass storage devices.

[Prometheus]

gadgetoid said:

A powerful enough USB hub situated inside should surely be able to power the Pi itself? It would also obviously supply ports for USB game controllers, bluetooth/wifi dongles, memory card readers or USB mass storage devices.
That's come up a lot. The forum search here is a bit useless, but the Google one on the RPi site's front-page ought to trawl it up.

(Also: Hey Gadge! Nice to see you over here! )

[oninoshiko]

ceramicsaturn said:


Forgive me for not understanding, but just curious; what use would having the SD card in the front be? The SD card slot is simply for OS, not for storage (where you'd put your rom). Unless I'm not fully understanding how the hardware will work...



The idea is not for ROMs of games for other platforms. The idea is for new inde games to actually target the Raspi as the platform. The game itself could then be put on the SD with just enough linux to boot and automaticly load the the game. This way you put the card in and push power, just like oh-so-many consoles. You are also not limiting yourself to the some OS installed intended for being a console, so if you want to do development, pop in a card for that!

I've already put a little thought into slapping together a "proto distro" for this. Maybe a series of proto-distros for different types of games? I don't know yet, I haven't developed the idea that far yet! This is all pretty trivial to do, you would just make your game, or atleast your game's startup script, be /sbin/init.

SD cards can be had for 1-2 USD, so this seems pretty reasonable (to me, atleast).

[pacman]

I just joined the adapter-game...

Normally, when developing software from an installed Linux, you'd write your compiled binary to the SD card, eject the SD card, move it to your PC or Mac, then copy the file, remove the SD card, insert another one, copy the file onto the new card, eject the card, insert the card in Raspberry Pi and reboot...

If you want a second SD card adapter...

http://en.esskabel.de/adapter/.....ard-usb/69

...You could write the file directly onto that SD-card, eject both cards and insert the new card into the 'master' SD slot and reboot.

I just found a panel-mount USB cable too:

http://importbestbuys.com/cata.....-3853.html

But I think all these adapters are way too expensive. Must be possible to get them cheaper on eBay.

Apart from the above, you might want to consider having a usb-to-serial too; you can find $1 adapters on eBay, but they require a driver (probably prolific PL2303)

[oninoshiko]

pacman said:


I just joined the adapter-game...

Normally, when developing software from an installed Linux, you'd write your compiled binary to the SD card, eject the SD card, move it to your PC or Mac, then copy the file, remove the SD card, insert another one, copy the file onto the new card, eject the card, insert the card in Raspberry Pi and reboot...


I think this would only be if you did full builds on the Raspi. I'm imagining just building a cross-compile toolkit on my linux machine. Either method would work though.


If you want a second SD card adapter...

http://en.esskabel.de/adapter/.....ard-usb/69

...You could write the file directly onto that SD-card, eject both cards and insert the new card into the 'master' SD slot and reboot.


I don't think (at least for my application) a second SD card is really required. I already have a USB SD reader, which can be easily plugged into any of the six USB ports I plan on putting out the front. (the 7th I plan on pulling power for the Raspi from)


I just found a panel-mount USB cable too:

http://importbestbuys.com/cata.....-3853.html

But I think all these adapters are way too expensive. Must be possible to get them cheaper on eBay.


I think just putting the USB hub in place so the ports face out will be enough. Your spot on (about it being too much) if I where to use six of these things for my USB ports out. I think more then I want to spend, but I will still think about it.


Apart from the above, you might want to consider having a usb-to-serial too; you can find $1 adapters on eBay, but they require a driver (probably prolific PL2303)


We use these things at work sometime. I cannot think why I would want one in this case.  At the vary least, the usage would be only occasional. I think attaching the dongle for those times to the outside-facing USB ports would be fine.