Here at MAKE, we love Raspberry Pi, the $35 mini computer that hails from the United Kingdom.
In this video, I’m going to show you how to get your Raspberry Pi up and running so
that you can start hacking, playing and experimenting with it.
The Raspberry Pi doesn’t just work right out of the box.
There are a few extra accessories you’ll need to use it and you may have some of them
in your workshop already.
The first thing you need is a 5 volt power supply that has a microUSB connector on it.
Be aware that not all 5V power supplies are created equal.
Look for one that can supply at least 700 milliamps.
You can check the adapter to see how much current it can supply.
You’ll also need an SD card.
Get one with at least four gigabytes.
You’ll need to load up Raspbian--Raspberry Pi’s custom distribution of Linux--onto
the card.
Just follow the instructions on the download page for how to download it and write it to
the card.
Be aware it’s not as simple as drag-and-drop, but they outline the steps very well to make
it fairly painless.
To connect it to the internet, you’ll need an ethernet cable that will connect to your
router.
If you can’t do that, you can also share your computer’s WiFi connection to its Ethernet
port.
The Raspberry Pi also supports USB WiFi adapters.
If you’d like to use the Raspberry Pi directly rather than over your network, you’ll need
a few more things.
You’ll need a monitor that you can connect to via HDMI or composite, along with the appropriate
cable.
If your monitor doesn’t have either of those connections, you’ll need to use an adapter.
Favor using the HDMI connector, if possible, for a better picture.
You’ll also need a USB keyboard and mouse.
I recommend connecting those through a powered USB hub, if you have one of those.
To get your Pi up and running, insert the SD card into the slot.
Be careful not to use this capacitor as a way of pushing the card into the board, it
can snap off.
Connect your mouse and keyboard to the Pi.
Connect your monitor using your display connector.
Connect your Pi via ethernet to your network.
Lastly, connect the power supply.
The Raspberry Pi has no on switch, so shortly after you plug it in, you should see the Raspberry
Pi logo along with some diagnostic text scrolling by on your monitor.
The first time you boot it up, it brings you into a configuration tool.
Use your keyboard to navigate these menus.
You’ll want to do a few things.
First choose to expand the root partition of the SD card.
This is so that you can use all the free space on your card.
Overscan is a feature that shrinks the display image down so that the edges don’t get cut
off in the monitor.
If you’re using the Raspberry Pi with a computer monitor, it won’t be a problem,
so turn overscan off to get rid of the black borders around the screen.
You’ll definitely want to set the keyboard layout to match your keyboard.
It’s configured for UK keyboards by default.
You may want to change the default password for your board if you’re using it on a network
that is shared with a lot of people.
Next is locale.
This deals with how characters are displayed.
Set it to match your language and country.
Then timezone.
You’ll want to set this to match your location.
Next is memory split.
This deals with the Raspberry Pi’s RAM, which is where a computer holds running programs
and open files.
You can change the allocation of RAM between the central processing unit, the CPU, and
the Graphical Processing Unit, the GPU.
This option lets you change how much of the total RAM is allocated to each.
I recommend leaving this alone for now.
Overclocking lets you squeeze more performance out of your Pi.
I recommend leaving this alone for now.
Enable SSH if you want to access your Raspberry Pi remotely over the network
Next is boot behavior.
If you’re planning on mostly using the graphical desktop environment, you can have it boot
right into that with this option.
When you’re done, hit finish and let your Raspberry Pi reboot.
This process may take a long time, especially if you’ve chosen to expand the root partition
to fill the SD card.
The next time you reboot, it’ll be much faster.
If you chose not to let the graphical desktop launch on startup, you’ll need to login
with the username “pi” and the password “raspberry” or whatever password you chose
before.
If you want to make anymore changes to the set up, you can run “sudo raspi-config”.
And to start the graphical desktop environment, type “startx”.
So now your Raspberry Pi is up and running, congratulations.
There’s so much you can do with the Raspberry Pi and we’ll have more videos about that
soon.
In the meantime, check out Getting Started with Raspberry Pi, a book I co-authored with
Shawn Wallace.
Also, check out Maker Shed's Raspberry Pi starter kit, which includes most of what you
need to get started including a Raspberry Pi and a copy of the book.
Check the video description for links.
Thanks for watching!