News

All news

Raspberry Pi Official Case

Want to buy one without reading about the adventure we had in getting this to you? Scroll to the bottom of this post.

Two and a half years ago, I found myself sitting in a car with Eben Upton about three days into my new job at Raspberry Pi. We discussed – among other things – everything we wanted to do with the Raspberry Pi hardware and with the products around the Pi.

One of the things we discussed was an official Raspberry Pi case. We thought that it would be great to create something affordable, but with the kind of real beauty and design that our products try to encompass.

So to this end we began the search for a design company who were capable of understanding our requirements and had their eyes firmly fixated on creating a product that achieved those aims.

Kinneir Dufort (click that link; there’s a lovely demonstration of how the case comes together) came to our attention and turned up with an amazing first set of ideas. Of all of these Eben and I were completely bowled over by the one on the inside front cover of the report (which contained in total 6 main designs and 20 secondary designs). But to make sure we weren’t being driven in the wrong direction we decided to continue with three main designs, which came out of prototyping looking like this:

appearance_model_clip

appearance_model_window

construct

Kinneir Dufort went away and created 3D designs and models to understand how they might work (or not work) and returned with the following:

rapid_prototypes

During the meeting we wanted to reduce it down to a final choice but found it really difficult to get there. Eben decided to make some small changes to the lovingly 3D printed version:

Eben_Hacksaw_Mod_1

We liked the idea of them adding an area for the logo but there wasn’t enough room, so Eben made room!

Next, Kinneir Dufort refined this to create a more complete model of the three designs with input from Eben and me. We finally decided that the Construct design was the ‘right one’ and they proceeded to finalise the design to be suitable for injection moulding.

appearance_models

We spent months refining the design until we got to a point where we thought that Construct – the case we’re selling today – was as good as a case possibly could be.

Meanwhile we went looking for a partner to work with for the manufacture of the cases and the design of the injection moulding tool. (And this, for those of you – I know there are some – who’ve been watching this project avidly since we first mentioned it and have been struck by how long it’s taken us, is where the delays came in.)

Initially we worked with a company based in the north of England to create an injection moulding tool. During this process we learnt a lot about injection moulding!

Injection moulding is quite simple in theory. You build a metal tool to shape the plastic. You take some pellets of your base material and mix in some master batch (that’s the colour pellets which you mix in around 1 – 2 percent). You then put these into an Archimedes screw that turns and pushes the pellets through a temperature-controlled system, which simultaneously melts and mixes the plastic.

injection_ram

The picture above is of the injection ram. Once the plastic is melted and pushed into the ram the ram then presses (with around a double decker bus’s force) the plastic into the mould.

tool_in_machine

Now, due to the massive pressures involved here, you simultaneously need to press with another double decker bus from the opposite direction to stop the plastic just spraying out of the mould. The next step is known as packing (this is ‘just keep pushing’ because as the plastic cools it contracts, making slight imperfections in the finish). From the picture above, you can see pipes at the top of the metal tool. These are where a coolant (usually just water) is piped through the mould to help cool the plastic, otherwise it gets deformed when you open the tool up.

After about 20-30 seconds of cooling (during which time the Archimedes screw is heating up the next shot of plastic) the mould is opened up and the plastic is ‘ejected’ from the mould by all those pins!

ejection_pins

You can see the ejection pins pushing the plastic out of the mould. If you get this wrong, the ejection pins will just make holes in the plastic!

In practice there are some things that maybe you might not have thought about. The time it takes to cool down is related to the volume of plastic injected and the thickest parts of the mould. This limits the speed at which you can make the cases, although you can flush through more cold water to help cool it, but this has a knock-on effect because you now need to push the plastic into the mould quicker, or you end up with lumpy bits of partly hardened plastic!

Also, you have to be careful pushing plastic from a thinner area to a thicker area because it doesn’t spread very well (meaning you have to push it for longer). Plus all of this stuff has to be done using very, very hard steel (remember those double decker busses…) which you can’t work on in normal ways like using drills, a file and a bit of elbow grease. Instead you have to use magic electrolysis (like they taught you at school), The picture below shows the copper anodes used to create the tool for various parts.

anodes

We spent a lot of time asking the toolmakers to make changes and the moulding company to press out some new cases – and then being annoyed that they weren’t perfect. We went through literally dozens of imperfect iterations – lumps here and there, clips that didn’t clip, inconsistent colours, ill-fitting parts, bits dropping off the case, incongruously fragile and snappy corners – and eventually we gave up and moved our business to a company a little more used to the type of high quality injection moulding that we required.

T-Zero, the company we should have gone with in the first place, is based in Dudley and employs a small team of dedicated people who know all this stuff upside down and back to front. They’re brilliant. Plus, they know a toolmaker, who doesn’t just know what he’s doing, but is also capable of turning the air blue whilst he’s doing it. :)

We met Brendan, Simon and Mandy because we really needed a second opinion about the tool we had already paid a significant amount of money for and that didn’t seem to be any closer to being finished after a year of small improvements. They looked at the tool and agreed that it could be salvaged and that they would be able to create the case of our dreams!

They then spent a couple of months working with us and their toolmaker to produce some truly awesome finished cases. The pictures you see above were taken during this process. The final case now clips together cleanly and stays clipped together, all the interfaces are ‘just right’ the colouring is perfect and it can be made in the quantities we were hoping for. We’re really proud of it.

So in conclusion, it’s not just plastic. It’s about design, love, attention to detail, accuracy, iteration and overall damn hard work! We think you’ll love this new case as much as we do. It’s functional, it’s very good looking, and you can pick one up from our own Swag Store, element14, or RS Electronics. (If you’re outside the UK, their local representatives – MCM Electronics, Newark and Allied in the USA and some other locations – also have them available; and we expect to see the cases appearing in other partners’ stores soon.)

If you’d like to know a little more about the whole process then please ask away in the comments.

147 comments

Easily too :-)

HTML skillz fail, anyway “easily customisable” was what I meant to say. …. https://twitter.com/daveake/status/572353526552133632/photo/1

It’s also super-cute with a Unicorn Hat in it – and the lid makes a great diffuser if you’ve got the neopixels on high. Picture of the nice fit at http://swag.raspberrypi.org/collections/frontpage/products/official-raspberry-pi-case.

Thank you so much for this comment, I asked two suppliers with no reply whether the Unicorn HAT would fit the official foundation case, just ordered the HAT from Pimoroni at their 15% off sale. Thanks again!

Just a shame it’s not extendable like some other cases. Sure looks pretty though :)

It would be great if the alternate designs were released so people could 3D print them.

I would also love it if all designs were published for us to 3D print; I love the one with the sliding door!

So how did you get the cases for the party? Where they from an earlier version of the tool and just with a lower success rate? Or are there actual improvements made since then?

They were the very first 1000 we had made; since then we’ve been building stock so that Farnell, RS and other partners now have pipeline. (Part of the problem with the tool was that although we initially had two made, we were only able to do remedial work on one, so we were producing cases half as fast as we wanted to be able to once we’d got the work done. We’re back to two now!)

Also there is a slight difference between the one’s we gave away and those on sale, we added an extra 0.1 mm to one of the face which made _all_ the difference :)

Gordon

Where did you add this extra 0.1mm and what problem did it solve?

Case looks pretty — but it looks like a modified travel bathroom soap holder — a bit disappointing but maybe it trendy now a days
regards

I love everything about this case. Bravo!

Great job!
I like this case so much!
It is a pity that Kinneir Dufort link refers to a password protected page.

My bad – it was an internal only page. I’ll update the link to the public one once the release it, hopefully later today.

Link’s updated. :)

finally…

This new case is beautifully designed. Thanks to everyone for their dedication and hard work on this. Easily the best looking case I’ve seen.

So I’m curious, is there a way to mount the new official case to a wall or something from the underbelly?

On the bottom half of the “frame” there are mounting points for rubber bumps for feet. We have deliberately thinned the walls in these mounting points such that you can easily knock them out with a drill bit or punch to accommodate mounting to a wall with countersunk screws or similar.

Are there direct links to where the case is available from USA suppliers? I can’t find it by searching or browsing the sites of the suppliers listed.

ANdy

MCM is your best bet. We updated the post with a link to the product page: http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/83-16321

Exact same colour as Southampton FC strip… im impressed, see pompey fans complain about that one lol, looks nice.. think im going to buy 2 for sure, 1 for display and the 2nd give it an Iron Man feel. Either way well done on the design and A++++ for the colour scheme and Southampton now has a smile on its face!

PS any news on the DSIPi touchscreens ?

Having found a link to these almost by accident, I immediately purchased one from the official raspberry Pi ‘swag store’, and was even more delighted when it was delivered the following morning!

My initial impressions are very favourable indeed, and I was surprised that it hadn’t been more widely publicised… or reviewed… but it looks as if that is now about to change!

Oh, and by the way, I also purchased the ‘official’ raspberry Pi Wi-Fi dongle from the same place, and expect to more about this interesting looking device shortly.

Keep up the good work, all you hard working guys and girls!

I love the story telling Gordon.

Ace.

I can’t wair for the reviews or to see the ‘hack-attacks’ on this beauty of a case (if i do say so myself).

It looks so good! I was wondering when the announcement was coming out for this.

Great job all. Learned a lot more about injection molding today :)

-Shea

Not as much as we did in the process!

It might be camera angle in the photos, but is the top curved ? Is this case stackable for those of us who (of course) have multiple Pi ? Is there a top that the camera module can be attached to ? Oooohhh…..cases……

We designed the case lid to be switchable (since it’s just a clippable lid) so the current design isn’t stackable. But it is possible that the right individual could create a stackable or camera lid!

We were also thinking about Xpress on lids!

Gordon

A replacement lid (or side) with mounts for a camera would make it slightly more useful. A option for a clear window at the top would also be nice.

Having said that, I’ll definitely be tempted to order one as case when next in need of a case. It is definitely better than the other cheap cases out there.

I agree with the clear top comment. I like the case otherwise, but the white top needlessly hides everything inside, IMHO.

I would definitely bug a Light Diffusing lid, as I have a Unicorn HAT under it and that is crazy bright, and looks much nicer Diffused. But these custom extras would be awesome in general.

Did you intend the colours to be raspberries and cream?

Looks great! I’m in the U.S. and not seeing it on Newark or Allied yet :(

Check out the MCM Electronics site – it’s live there.

Thank you! Found it!

The link for those also looking. http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/83-16321

What about CSI, DSI and GPIO?
No slots or anything?

Next blog post should be (might not be anything on the blog for a while…):
Raspberry Pi Official Screen

AIUI the idea is that if you fit all the white pieces you completely enclose the Pi but if you need more access while still maintaining some protection you can remove some or all of the white pieces leaving the Pi in the raspberry coloured core.

Fascinating article for those like me who didn’t previously know anything about injection moulding.

This must be the first time ever that I haven’t skipped to buy something before reading about it :)

It looks like a very expensive process , and you can see where poorly made/designed cases come from when you consider how much it must cost to alter designs to get it ‘just right’. Must be tempting to leave a design as it is, if it isn’t quite right.

Oh god yes!

But in the end we always have an uncompromising position here on design and quality. Which is upheld through all our official Raspberry Pi products.

Gordon

Is the top flat? It doesn’t look it, which would make it unsuitable for stacking.

The top is curved. This one’s not for stacking.

WHAT?

What happend with the display?

Is that red or deep pink?

Deep, manly pink. Like a banker’s shirt.

After seeing this case at the Maker Faire, I’ve been waiting for the release to order a bunch. Planning to order 10 of them this afternoon.

Splendid. Only 99990 to go and we’ll have made our money back.

I made good on my plan, so you can bank the profit on those 10.

Does it have a VESA mount?

It has some knockouts in the bottom for screwholes but you will need an adapter plate to fit it to a vesa mount.

I would also advise the use of nylon screws as there is not much clearance under the pi.

My memory from the birthday party is that someone was demoing a vesa adaptor plate that works with a load of cases including the new official one. I think it may have been the pimironi ominvesa but their website doesn’t say anything about the new official case.

Looks nice. Is the white top cover removable to enable access to GPIO, camera connector etc?

The case is supplied in 5 parts. The lid and sides are detachable from the central red “frame” as seen in the injection mould shots.

http://www.kinneirdufort.com/raspberry-pi

I guess they can’t be stacked, nor items placed on top, since it’s rounded. I Curious choice without a reason such as vents on top that shouldn’t be blocked.

I wonder if it effectively blocks flashbulbs from crashing the unit

If the case comes in 5 separate pieces, maybe the rounded top could be replaced with an aftermarket flat top?

The top of the core is also rounded so an aftermarket “flat top” would have to have a significant thickness variation to make up for that which I don’t think would be terribly practical.

Patience, folks! Be aware of time and timezone. The UK is in sleep mode – look for more news around *their* wakey-workey, readey-typey time.

Don’t think many folk in the UK are in ‘sleep mode’ at 5 to 8 in the evening… although they well have finished ‘work’ for the day!

And to answer the previous post… the white bits just ‘pop off’ and be easily clipped on again if required.

It is a very nice piece of kit!

You assume that we all keep to nominal local daylight hours :]

https://xkcd.com/448/

Just a wish… Any chance of getting a case for 4 Pi’s? I hate to see my 3 Pi’s using so much room at my desk. A cheap 4-Pi case would be great even if it’s not good looking… and if you could stack them up, you could easily grow to 8 Pi’s…

We already do, that the Raspberry Pi 2 right…

Gordon

Yeah, of course… but you know what I mean… :[

Coming from years of experience in the hobby of plastic miniatures for table-top wargames, I’m far more familiar with this process than most people. I’m a consumer of the product, not a creator, however the experience with plastic injection molding that you described is so similar to the experience I’ve heard from miniature makers, the products names could have simply been swapped.
Congratulations for coming out ahead and for the decision to change companies seemingly mid-stream after many lost months of progress. I think you made the right call.

Made in Dudley. That makes this black country boy proud.

If you need light engineering doing in the UK, it’s hard to beat the West Midlands.

Is there likely to be a version for the A+ ?

Probably not – A+ doesn’t sell enough units to justify the cost. It’s a shame, because there’s not that much extra design work involved and I can imagine how sweet it would look.

Eben – can an A+ just be stuck in the end of the case where everything on two sides does line up (HDMI, audio/composite-video, USB, etc.), and you just ignore the empty E-net and second/third/fourth USB jack voids, as well as remove the board to access the micro-SD card slot (if it can’t be inserted/removed with the board installed)? Not sure what that means for the GPIO alignment, though. Too bad the case couldn’t be even more modular to provide for the variances between all of the Pi models, but I fully understand the cost/engineering trade-offs, and that version is called a LEGO case, I guess! :D

A+ does fit into the case, but the USB is not in the correct place and it’ll wiggle around!

The reason it wasn’t changed was because we hadn’t come up with the idea for A+ when we did the design for the B+ layout (yes it really was _that_ long ago!)

Gordon

Here is a pic with the A+ installed. The power jack, HDMI out and A/V out all line up on the side, but as mentioned, the USB port is recessed pretty far back in the case. When tested though, it didn’t really rattle around too much with the sides on. The locator pins hold it in place fairly well.

Image: http://www.mcmelectronics.com/content/productimages/s5/83-16321_5.jpg

After some thought (you could probably hear the gears grinding from over there), it occurs to me that *if* an A+ case were made and a while after that a 512MB A+ were to be released, you could “double dip” on people that want cased A+ models. Eventually, when manufacturing costs come down, there would be a third bite at the market when a Pi2A is finally possible.

The engineering costs for an A+ case ought to be a lot lower, since you’ve already been through the learning curve getting this one out the door. (Granted A+ sales are undoubtedly much lower than B+/Pi2B, so the proportions might be rather similar.)

Just a couple of things to contemplate.

Even the product announcement is an educational bonanza! I was delighted to learn so much about injection moulding.

I can see how this design allows a variety of special purpose lids to be sold as accessories – display top, camera top, sensor top – all fitting nicely onto the existing remainder of the case.

You guys are continuing to do a fantastic job serving the world’s curious minds.

Eagerly waiting for you official display, but happy to wait while you know you have it right!

Indeed… as a D&T teacher, the insights into the design and production processes are extremely valuable. It’s great to have a real-world example to show, along with photos of the machines that made them. Equally interesting are the little (or maybe big) decisions taken when production doesn’t go as planned. Thanks for sharing this on the blog.

In addition, the early details of the PCB manufacture, population and assembly were really handy.

Raspberry Pi – not just about the final product but also the stages needed to get there! Thanks folks…

I don’t think I conveyed enough excitement to Liz and Eben when Hal and I saw the case at Maker Faire San Francisco/Mateo in May, but I do want to make sure I take that opportunity here. The colors are stunning and the component aspect is tremendously useful. I won’t be surprised when a clear cover option pops up from Pimoroni or another third-“Pirty” (pronounced with an Irish accent) manufacturer ;)

I’m very familiar with the injection (and ejection, as it turns out :) molding process as a relative used to be a foreman running and maintaining these machines (his 38-year career ended when the U.S. company he worked for was the last volume manufacturer to give up competing with Chinese slave-labor wages and went out of business). The tens of thousands of pounds per square inch required to keep the plastic from “squirting out the sides” of the molds is just amazing, and I wonder how long it will be before we will see Pi-controlled injection molding machines … making Pi cases ;)

Like Nobel prize winners and farmers on their plots, this is yet-another group outstanding in their fields! :D

Actually I installed 40 Pi’s into an injection moulding company in Adelaide Australia.

So while Pi’s may not be making Pi’s, Pi’s are already in control of injection moulding machines.

Looks great! But once again (although there aren’t pics of the back, there is one from above) it looks like the SD card is accessible to any grubby fingers that wander past, instead of being sealed up inside the case. (And I don’t see where it conceives of mounting a camera module.)

But I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining – no single design can solve every problem.

You can easily remove the lid to connect the camera or one of the sides, having a slot would completely spoil the look of the case.

I’m sure we can release CAD for the lid so that the enterprising among you can create your own ‘caps’ with camera support / flat caps etc.

Gordon

Chiming in on that:

It would be great to have some basic cad drawings of the whole case, like the typical three sides view in a lot of datasheets.

This would help tremendously when someone is about to place components on a HAT: what is the distance between the pcb and the outside of the walls, what is the pcb “footprint” of the hole in the red lid etc.

Slightly related: I am unsure how mounting the standoffs for a hat can be made compatible with the case. Is cutting off some of the nubs in the bottom part good enough?

Thanks,
Simon

I do not like this case at all.

Reasons:

1) It is curved – not stackable.
2) Too many parts – I much prefer a case that is just two pieces.
3) To access the rPi in a comfortable manner, I have to throw away pieces of the case? Great, more detritus for the junk-drawer. (A good case would be complete without requiring modifications by the user..)
4) The design follows the typical “bar of soap” methodology – designed to look good and feel good in your hands, but this is not always practical. All the indentation and curves will collect dust/gunk over time.

Basically it looks to me like this case was designed for fashion and aesthetics purposes – i.e. to sell well – rather than for practical applications.

Fortunately there are other rPi case vendors out there who provide better products – of course this is just my opinion, but in case you don’t hear it much: this is not a nice case.

I’d suggest not buying it then. Other cases are available.

#HitsThe’Like’Button

Fortunately, opinions are like butt-cracks, everyone’s got one!

This _is_ a nice case, you’re just not a nice person, unlike everyone I’ve ever met in the Foundation (yes, I’m sure even James Hughes, when I finally run into him). If the Pi board had been frozen for production at the very first version, it would have been quite functional … and quite ugly and difficult to use.

You don’t need the cover except on the top unit if you stack a number of them. Now, did they design it to interlock top-to-bottom? I doubt it from what I remember of the hands-on time I had with it, but it should be pretty readily modded to create tab/slot interlocking. This should be a v2.0 feature, though.

You never have to throw away thermoplastics – they can be recycled either for other projects you may work on, or via waste management.

The plastic used has fairly smooth surfaces that, while definitely not glossy, I don’t think will capture much grime. If it’s in an environment where gunk is the norm, _any_ material is going to get filthy. Greasy fingers and particulates are what create nightmares – I taught in a classroom in a town named Seaside, where the structures are literally built on glacial sand dunes hundreds of feet high (the adjacent seaward municipality is Sand City!). The smallest, lightest sand particles got blown onto and into everything, to the point where the custodians had to use electric leaf blowers after classes to get the sand outside in the time alotted. The computing equipment wound up with a fine grit on them that, even with black injection-mo(u)lded plastic typically used, eventually caused everything to become abraded or clogged. Sometimes you just have to have a physically-controlled environment if you want perfect cleanliness (positive pressure rooms, mandated hand-washing, full face masks with personal air supply, etc., aka medical or semiconductor clean-room technology).

As you noted, if people want no-frills functionality, there are alternatives, but they all have warts, and many have far more than this case. I’m not a big fan of aesthetic over-design of technical objects that suffer functionality-wise, but this is not an example of that in any way. If it does enhance sales, that means more funding for the primary educational mission of the Foundation, and apparently you don’t think that’s important. Well, perhaps you need to go back to school with an emphasis on math and economics then …

“Fortunately, opinions are like butt-cracks, everyone’s got one!

“This _is_ a nice case, you’re just not a nice person, unlike everyone I’ve ever met in the Foundation (yes, I’m sure even James Hughes, when I finally run into him). ”

Hopefully you didn’t read this after you posted it, and wasn’t tempted to adjust it.

To summarize what you said:

1) People have opinions.
2) Your opinion is wrong.
3) You are a bad person.
4) I mingle with the cool people, so I know all about this stuff.
5)
6) Rationalization ramble
7) “Go back to school”

Curious post. Are there no moderators on this forum?

Yup. I agree it’s an odd post.

Will there be other colours? Also the open space, would it allow a little screen to be placed inside?

The Adafruit PiTFT screen fits well – http://www.mcmelectronics.com/content/productimages/s5/83-16321_4.jpg

We’re sure other similar screens would as well.

What size PiTFT display is that shown in the case? I’d like to get as large of a screen as possible (like the 3.5 inch diagonal PiTFT.. if it would fit)

Thanks for your input

Looks OK, but not for me with curved sides and top, not easy to stack, mount anywhere or mount switches etc, no cable entry for camera, not much, if any, space for HATS etc.

The sides are not curved. (I have one on my desk in front of me.)

You can get free delivery in the UK from CPC by using the Element14 part number: 2426746 on cpc.co.uk

What type of plastic is the case made of? Sorry if this has been mentioned and I missed it.

It’s ABS.

just take my money!!!

We’d be delighted to. Links to buy are in the post. :)

I am waiting on the official Rapsberry Pi screen that was announced November last year. Will this case be able to fit that screen or was it created with allowing it to fit in the future?

The screen is getting closer, and should be available fairly soon. With the lid off the case you can use a camera module or the DSI display – they both have a flex cable which would protrude from the Pi and case. Apart from the lid, nothing would get in the way.

Let’s hope that the screen becomes available very soon indeed. Just about every day I go to the pi webpage to check whether it has been launched !

We’ve been using three of these in the family since getting our hands on them at the Pi party and one thing I love is that it’s really well-built – if you drop it onto a hard surface the pieces fly apart in spectacular fashion but just clip cleanly back together as before. It looks great under the TV with just an IR sensor peeping out of the box, a refreshing change from all the black slabs.

I must say! I was disappointed that you didn’t release the screen first. But now, I read that the case is made of ABS. This is great, because it’s robust and it doesn’t contain this plastic toxics. GREAT WORK!

Will the middle one, that looks like a GameBoy, be availlable as non-official one ? It looks great and seems mod-able.

ABS is generally a low-hazard material and presents few risks to health. However, in some situations, precautions are advisable:

Heating up ABS during production (for molding or extrusion as well as in 3D Printing) produce fumes of poisonous acrylonitrile. There is some concern that acrylonitrile could be a human carcinogen. Butadiene is a known carcinogen. Styrene is also believed to have carcinogenic properties.[4] That is why it is dangerous for health to use ABS in 3D Printing. Sealed special boxes with powerful air funnels and remote controlling of the process can mitigate the risks associated with the use of ABS.
ABS can be used for the storage of cold food. However, alcohol can produce a reaction similar to heating and styrene is evolved.[citation needed]
ABS should not be used in medical implants.

You’ve just copied and pasted that directly from Wikipedia, haven’t you? :P (Google is my friend.)

Text with the string “[citation needed]” is a pretty broad hint it’s either Wikipedia or an ironic reference thereto!

Looking carefully, It appears as though from the early prototypes that the B+ originally had the audio jack and micro-usb on the other sides (similar to the original B), did the designing of case inspire to push them to the same side as the HDMI?

When we first designed the case we were thinking of the Model B, but it soon became apparent that it would be B+ layout!

So yes much of the organisation of the B+ is in some part due to it’s manipulation to make it fit the case better, examples:

LED’s are sideways looking ones that the light pipes then transfer to the wall (nobody noticed that!)

Power was moved to the back

Edges rounded

But actually the audio change was more about cost reduction than case…

Gordon

One of the nice things about getting a development process story from Gordon is that it stands as a reminder that making stuff takes *time* and *effort* and it’s not all free.

Also a small technical point; simply heating the feedstock pellets from the outside of the injector isn’t enough since you can get charring and other bad things. The screw in the injector doesn’t simply try to force the liquified material into the mould but rather it is a vital part of heating the pellets. The shearing action as it stirs (or maybe churns is a better image) the feedstock causes heating within the bulk of the pellets. Think of it a little like smearing cold butter. Decently simple explanation at http://www.azom.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=265#_Injection

Dear sirs,

I do believe the hole for the power connector is not big enough. I bought some chinese case for the raspberry 2 – and it was way too small (so i drilled big holes in the plate) – and it seems +/- the same in this case. The connector should go deep enough into the micro-usb to keep running safely.

(i’d rather have a 2nd more ridgit connector/connection as with standard 12v external hard disks – and the possibility to supply several raspberry 2’s with ONE power supply).

I don’t care wheter that’s a standard big sized USB-connector (for power – the full BIG plain old size! no micro, mini or usb3.1c-rubbish).

It may seem i’m an unhappy raspberry pi user – well that’s not the case, it’s just this micro-usb that’s making me a little bit unhappy.

kind regards and go on – the raspberry pi is making a lot of us happy (and we’d be happier with an extra more sturdy power-connector)

The hole for the power connector on THIS case is the right size. We can’t speak for any third party cases you’ve bought from China, though!

Please add the option for the clear top!

I second that.

The design with the memory card shaped window would be my choice – as 1) it looks coolest and 2) it is flat and would allow stacking.

Can’t please everybody I suppose.

Now that there IS an official case, might be time to update the FAQ: https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/faqs/

(also, the FAQ seems to think Pi means single-core ARM v6 cpu :-)

Awesome pick up my stock this morning to find the new funky case in the box Thank you Raspberry Pi

HI can Anyone help me out where to buy official case in india i searched all websites but in vain

Could anyone please post pictures or youtube videos of how the light from the leds look on the wall of the case ? Thank you.

Also some falling tests :)

Fascinating. What was the cost of producing the tool?

An eye-watering amount of time, more so than the money.

Each of the revisions to the case design required the careful removal of fractions of a millimetre of hardened steel – not something you can do with your everyday half-moon coarse file.

Of course, if you needed to remove plastic – that meant you had to add metal – which meant drilling out a section of the mould and re-fitting a lump of steel which then again needs to be carefully shaped to what you wanted it to be in the first place.

What?? No handlebars or cup holder? Outrageous!

Seriously, though — it’s a beaut, and I look forward to adding one to my collection of Pi gear.

Well done, gang!

p.s.

I looked and looked, but couldn’t find any info on shipping charges at Casa de Swag. Am I just not seeing a link?

I don’t have time to read all the comments so I apologize if this request is redundant.

I’d love an additional part, a riser that would click into the hole on top and into which would click the lid. This is to enable encasing a Pi project which has an extension board added on. I assume the hole to be big enough. Height to be determined.

Beautifully simple, a bit like the pi itself.

I wanted to order one yesterday but the shop had some technical problems. Today it is sold out :(

Will they be available again soon?

Nice box but it seems a little strange that some of the more simple and obvious straight forward design elements is not included in the final design.

I actually find it unbelievable that they, after all they had to endure, did not end up with a more functional end product. It looks like it was all about a sleek design without to much focus on functionality.

If they had just started out with at least the following minimum functionality specifications:
The box must provide space for internal mounting of the pi camera.
The box must be stackable.
The box must have an option with some kind of transparent top (maybe as some of the prototypes has).
The box must be easy to wall mount.
A couple of screw holes must be provided that user may use IF a need for securing the lid 100% is present.
The box must provide some way of securing the sd-card (if for example the box is mounted in a public place).

the end product would have been much much more interesting and a killer product.

/Bo

There are cases out there that will have some if not all of your requests. This case isn’t meant to capture the WHOLE market for Pi cases, that would be impossible. What it is meant for is the average user, and the average users doesn’t actually need any of the things you mention.

Who knows what the average user needs. The raspberry community is HUGE, and if you are going to make an official Raspberry Pi case, why not focus on design AND at least some basic usability issues that would also make it interesting for the maker community. A nice design do not have to exclude usability.

I’m just puzzled by the fact that they went through so much trouble and did not even include space for their own pi camera. In my humble opinion, they opted to focus on design alone, and did not care to much about anything else.

I suspect “average user” includes a wide range of applications: is a user who includes a TFT screen any more or less “average” than one who uses a Pi with a camera?

It is true that a subset of user applications was targeted by this case, as lovely as this case is, and there will be users who wish it covered more.

I, for one, would love to learn more about these cases you mention that enclose the SD card and include a camera option. The only vendor I had found which met those seemingly simple requirements chose to exit the market after the variety of models grew and obliterated their economic model.

Still, I do congratulate the team for adding another lovely case to the broad range of existing cases for tinkering with the Pi.

And I’ve just got two here of these fine new cases and one of them is a chocolate teapot. The clear plastic light guides weren’t pushed far enough in and now provide a solid obstacle to getting the Pi into the case and clipped in. You can shove it in, but the case won’t keep its lid on either. Not exactly sure what to do with it now. At least I got one working one….

Sounds like a duff one, although my case doesn’t have the clear plastic light guides, so not sure exactly what might be wrong. Mine was was of the preproduction birthday bash ones.

If it’s one of the birthday ones, the problem might be that they were all assembled (all 1000 of them – Mike’s hands were actually bleeding by the end of it) in a great hurry the night before by a bunch of us at Pi Towers. In which case, apologies! The light pipes can be pushed in manually; have you tried giving them a firm push?

No, these were ordered through Pi Swag. I popped it out and repositioned it. Then applied violence. It seems to have gone in now. :)

Good – and apologies!

Same with the one that just turned up this morning from the Swag store. The light guide for the LEDs was not quite pushed home so the Pi couldn’t sit far enough over to engage with the pegs that go through the screw holes. Removed and replaced the light guide, and everything fits correctly now.

Also a little bit of mould flashing on the inside of top white lid (just above the composite connector when fitted) caused it to sit a little high on that side and not clip fully home. Trimmed it off with a sharp knife and it’s all good!

Like someone before me I would also would like to ask if there are .stl files for the case.
It would not only allow people to make their own, but also to repair damaged parts or make simple modifications.

Nice!

Would you consider also selling a black-raspberry one if there was enough demand?
Also, an official stackable top plate would indeed be useful :)

Beautiful case. (Back) Ordering now!

Quick question – does it have space/slit under the top cover to let out a breakout cable for the GPIO ports?

More pictures please :-)…

No it does not have a slot for GPIO cables, but the side can be completely removed to gain access to the GPIO

Gordon

Realmente bellas, espero poder conseguirlas en Argentina.

It would be more suited for developers if you made metal pins on the outside that connected to the Pi’s actual GPIO boards so you could attach pins to the GPIO board using these connecting pins from outside the case. That way, the purpose of the case-protecting the Pi- will be complete, because it will be harder to damage the GPIO pins.

I’m surprised the issue of heat control hasn’t been mentioned. I like cases which have a little cooling fan on an acrylic top piece. Alternatively, the metallic FLIRC case works also a heat sink due to careful design regarding board placement.

I am sure heat control was considered, any conclusions?

I live in Thailand and it gets bloody hot here!

Don
BTW, Lovely looking case. Yes, needs to be stackable. Good work guys!

Heat should not be a problem, except in exceptional circumstances (inside a steel box in a desert?). The chip is designed to work well up to 85, but can go higher. At 85 it will throttle itself to cool itself down.

Which inches size… (what exact model) of PI TFT does this case support?

Love this case! Are it going to be available on Amazon, too?

Will this ever come in black?

How do you fit the camera module?

You can slot it through the gap above the ethernet port

Can anyone verify if this case will fit the Pi 2 with Sense HAT attached?

Yes, it fits very well, in fact.

I have just received mine and I am totally blown away by the aesthetic and build quality of this case. I especially adore the colour choices, the red is delicious, very raspberry, the exceptionally white blends with the red perfectly.

The sexy curved body provides firm grip on the sides. The matte finish feels just right.

You guys truly nailed it!

Comments are closed

News

Latest posts

Paragraphica creates "photos" based on your location

Dragonfly Spectral Line Mapper

Refurbished vending machine

DSO-500K oscilloscope | HackSpace #67

Next Post

Diddyborg metal edition

Previous Post

Kite mapping

Share this post

147 comments

Dave Akerman

Dave Akerman

Ben Thorp

Sammy Hendrick

Peter Green

Dan Potgieter

Rob K

Alessandro

jdb

ajk

Daza

David Rolfe

Vince Skahan

Mathew

Jeff Findley

aremvee

Ngoc Pham

Eben Upton

Ngoc Pham

Peter Green

Eben Upton

ulix

Eben Upton

whheydt

Eben Upton

whheydt

Robert, USA

Peter Green

JBeale

jdb

Joe K

JBeale

Peter Green

Dex Muir

David Rolfe

jdb

Vlad

Vlad

Eben Upton

Kevin Hainsworth

Eben Upton

Jim Manley

whheydt

Jim Manley

Tony In Australia

Paul O

Simon

Jay Vaughan

James Hughes

Gary Littlemore

Jim Manley

Thingy

James Hughes

Enira

Andrew

gordon77

whheydt

Paul Davis

Janw

Eben Upton

Jack Chong

Tom De Blende

richard mullens

Martin Mander

ulix

richard mullens

toomellow

JBeale