Raspberry Pi launches at RS & Farnell - and kills their websites - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: kaz911
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 06:23:41 am
content: The $35 Raspberry Pi has launched for sale today via RS and FarnellResult - both RS & Farnell are - DOWN.. completely down.. And Farnell servers took Element14.com down with it.Raspberry foundation says they did warn RS & Farnell...Follow the comedy onhttps://twitter.com/#!/raspberry_pi

author: 8086
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 06:43:25 am
content: I've been trying and trying to get somewhere with the pre orders, but with the wrong pages loading on RS, and farnell down completely, I think I'll give up.Farnell is supposedly sold out anyway!

author: Mint.
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 06:46:29 am
content: No way! I didn't think the thing could be so big!

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 06:47:10 am
content: Quote from: kaz911 on February 29, 2012, 06:23:41 amCouldn't have happened to a nicer bunch.

author: metalphreak
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 08:30:18 am
content: http://au.element14.com/raspberry-pi/raspbrry-pcba/sbc-raspberry-pi-model-b/dp/2081185AU preordersWebsite works fine here. Datasheet is on farnell.com so won't load though.

author: JuKu
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 08:59:40 am
content: Darn, I needed something else from Farnell. I hope I can place the order later today.

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 09:29:20 am
content: Has anyone heard anything about a US supplier?

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 09:44:18 am
content: A bit surprised by them selling through RS & Farnell - there must be little enough margin to start with before adding a distributor margin.

author: baljemmett
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 09:49:59 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on February 29, 2012, 09:44:18 amThey claim to still be getting a per-unit royalty on the devices -- it sounds like they're basically letting RS and Farnell take care of building them all under license, instead of having to worry about it themselves, which might well reduce the Foundation's overheads enough to make it worthwhile? Just a guess, of course!

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 09:53:05 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on February 29, 2012, 09:44:18 amIf I got it correctly from the bits they post then RS and Farnell did run their own manufacturing under a license. I.e. they have more control over the cost than just distributing someone else's production.Quote

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:14:18 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on February 29, 2012, 09:44:18 amYep, they'd be making bugger-all out it I suspect.Dave.

author: updatelee
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:16:45 am
content: FYI you can preorder from any element14 site. I ordered mine fromcanada.newark.comChris Lee

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:26:37 am
content: What isn't clear is what's happenning to the first (10K?) batch that Rpi kicked off and is due in about now - are these going to RS/Farnell or have they already been allocated by Rpi?

author: GeoffS
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:32:02 am
content: Got my order in, now the wait begins.

author: GeoffS
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:40:13 am
content: Of course if you're desperate, you can always pick one up oneBay.Didn't take long.

author: metalphreak
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:43:07 am
content: Should really stop pasting that ebay link around, because it seems to be tempting people to purchase when its clearly a scam. The RPi team on twitter have already said not to buy on ebay as there is no way he has 1, let alone 50 of them. The picture is taken from one of their videos as a screencap.

author: GeoffS
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 10:56:27 am
content: I was kind of assuming that people would work out it was a scam as the foundation has already announce that initial orders will be limited to one, not fifty. Also RaspberryPi have said that they will sell some units on eBay to prevent scalpersAs my order is unlikely to be filled from this initial batch, I might just add a few more to the order

author: Hypernova
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 11:45:50 am
content: What's the rush? With the amount of interest there will be without a doubt many more batches to come.

author: AntiProtonBoy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 12:01:40 pm
content: Quote from: GeoffS on February 29, 2012, 10:40:13 amlolhttp://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Raspberry-Pi-Model-B-Ethernet-700MHz-ARM-SBC-/170793413181?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item27c414aa3dWho wants to pick one up for 999 Pounds?

author: johnboxall
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 12:43:21 pm
content: Quote from: Hypernova on February 29, 2012, 11:45:50 amExactly - life goes on.

author: metalphreak
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 12:52:10 pm
content: QuoteHaha. Maybe he ordered 50 from farnell, and then put them on ebay as soon as the order went through, only to be DENIED.

author: slateraptor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 01:09:16 pm
content: Quote from: GeoffS on February 29, 2012, 10:56:27 amThank goodness they're making a conscious effort to deter scalpers. Damn opportunists abound.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 01:28:06 pm
content: Quote from: AntiProtonBoy on February 29, 2012, 12:01:40 pmQuoteSeller got cold feet or did find an idiot doing the deal outside of eBay.

author: FreeThinker
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 04:07:10 pm
content: Quote from: GeoffS on February 29, 2012, 10:40:13 amSold Out

author: caroper
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 04:52:40 pm
content: I got my order in at RS South Africa R259.20 is not a bad priceI believe that China let them down on the initial order of 10K parts so they have farmed out production to Farnell and RS who are able to take preorder's and manage manufacture and distribution better. I have only been following this from the edge so maybe someone on the twitter list can fill in the details.Damn good specs for a board at that price though even if I never end up using it I can put it in the trophy cabinet along with my Sinclair ZX80

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 05:00:23 pm
content: Farnell's Damage control- Rpi or anything else...

author: nessatse
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: February 29, 2012, 09:47:53 pm
content: Quote from: caroper on February 29, 2012, 04:52:40 pmDid you order in on their website? All I get is the "Register here to express an interest..." page.

author: Jimmy
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 01:33:15 am
content: Quote from: tronixstuff on February 29, 2012, 12:43:21 pmI agree life does go on but the estimated delivery date for my r-pi is 5/3/2012 it helps to be a business customer with automated account to get in easily

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 02:13:33 am
content: Quote from: Jimmy on March 01, 2012, 01:33:15 amIs that 5th March or May 3rd?

author: Pentium100
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 04:43:35 am
content: Looks interesting. Too bad it does not have a parallel port (or two serial ports instead of one), but it only uses 3.5W which is much less than what I am planning to use now for that purpose (a small PC with Cyrix MediaGX 233MHz CPU). It will also be insteresting to see how difficult it is to write programs for it compared to a PC.But I'll wait for this rush to end before buying one - I'm in no hurry

author: joelby
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 05:34:59 am
content: It has a GPIO port, which would replace a parallel port for many applications (or were you hoping to connect a Centronics printer to it?). You can use a USB-serial adaptor and USB hub for all the serial ports you'll ever need.It'll be no harder to write programs for than any Linux system.

author: Pentium100
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 06:28:37 am
content: Wikipedia says it has 8 GPIO pins, while parallel ports has 12 outputs and 4 inputs (or 12 I/O and 4 inputs, depending on the port).USB-serial is good, but only if it has drivers that will work on that version of Linux.As for writing programs - for now I mostly written programs for DOS (Turbo Pascal and a tiny bit asm) and Windows (Delphi) and some shell scripts for Linux. But, if I can find a language similar to Pascal on Linux that would be great. If not, maybe I'll manage witch C, but it will be much harder than Pascal.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 08:15:23 am
content: I just saw a news segment on SBS about the RPi, saying it will hopefully create a whole new revolution in computer learning.And they mentioned it went on sale today and sold out within hours.Dave.

author: caroper
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 01, 2012, 08:49:31 am
content: Quote from: nessatse on February 29, 2012, 09:47:53 pmsame here, I guess I should have said registered rather than ordered, but I hop that by registering they reserve one for you to order. It would be rather annoying if you register and then still have to take pot luck when they get stock.