New Pi Zero W on sale now

[Ed P]

Same attractive price of under a fiver, but the new Pi Zero W has inbuilt Wifi and Bluetooth just like its big brother. The USB connection is now full OTG. What else to say except damn – I just finished soldering up a Pi Zero and attaching all those peripherals as add-ons!

[Jason]

Nice, though the price has actually doubled. It’s $10, or £9.60 at UK stockists (all sold out).

[Ed P]

Thanks for the correction – the flyer I received yesterday obviously had the wrong info. (it still said SOLD OUT however). Yesterday the Pi _ adapter kit was still on offer at £14 but even that has gone today. What I should probably have added is that this one has both flavours of Bluetooth on board and gives access to the low-energy BLE kit so opening up some compatibility with Apple’s benighted walled-garden.

[The Duke]

Same story with evey pi launch, they sell out quick and mark up are big. Give it two months and all will be well.

[Jason]

Maybe, but the original Zero can still be hard to find, and it’s limited to one per customer, which is a problem for folks buying them for schools or bigger projects.

$10 (£9.60) is the official price, not a marked up price.

[The Duke]

I meant marked up as pit with kits for sill prices. That’s what happens with the frost 3, or maybe 2, you could only by then included with “starter ” kits. For twice what the kit was worth. Just people cashing in.

I actually have a project that a pi zero with wifi is made for. Ill need about 10 of them so at £10 a pop it’s not bad at all.

[Jason]

Still very good value, indeed. Remarkable, in fact.

[PlaneMan]

My Pi Zero W came just now.

Sadly I won’t have much time to play with it before it goes to it’s new home on Sunday. Mums’ getting it for Mothers Day.  A few months back she mentioned that she wanted to learn some basic programming, so now she’ll be able to.  🙂

[Jason]

Is there a Basic IDE for it? 😉

[Ed P]

Not squite ure what you mean by ‘IDE’. The Pi Zero W comes with no OS, software or anything else. However you can load download and install either Linux (a Debian varoety) or Windows 10 (no gui) onto an SD card (its primary storage medium). The Debian version is Raspbian Pixel and comes with a very usable GUI.

If you really mean IDE – then yes, the Debian version has Python 3 and a choice of very different but quite usable IDEs (One of the primary purposes of a Pi is to teach school children how to program. The Windows version uses a .Net system and a version of visual studio. The entrance costs to using Windows hardware are a  little higher so I have not yet had a play with it.

If you can overcome the usually soldering barrier then the Pi zero is also a pretty good little card to learn how to make useful and functional  bits of tech ranging from home automation through to robots.

[Author]

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