Electronics Weekly
Costing $10, it gets the same Cypress CYW43438 wireless chip as Raspberry Pi 3 Model B to provide 802.11n wireless LAN and Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity.
It also picks up a camera interface that was not on the original Zero.
“We imagine you’ll find all sorts of uses for Zero W,” said Foundation co-founder Eben Upton. “It makes a better general-purpose computer because you’re less likely to need a hub: if you’re using Bluetooth peripherals you might well end up with nothing at all plugged into the USB port. And of course it’s a great platform for experimenting with IoT applications.”
Raspberry Pi, Kinneir Dufort and T-Zero have together created an official injection-moulded case, looking like a smaller version of the official Raspberry Pi 3 case.
It has three interchangeable lids:
- blank
- with GPIO access aperture
- with camera aperture and mount
The list of distributors that carry Zero has been extended and now includes: ModMyPi in the UK, pi3g in Germany, Samm Teknoloji in Turkey, Kubii in France, Spain, Italy and Portugal, and Kiwi Electronics in the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg.
Raspbrerry Pi Zero W at a glance:
- 1GHz, single-core CPU
- 512Mbyte RAM
- Mini-HDMI port
- Micro-USB On-The-Go port
- Micro-USB power
- HAT-compatible 40-pin header
- Composite video and reset headers
- CSI camera connector
- 802.11n wireless LAN
- Bluetooth 4.0
- Official case
I have not looked into the packaging. I assumed it was the same arrangement as combined idea as Raspberry Pi 1, am I wrong?
I think you are right, that the packaging is the same.
What has changed over the years is the realisation that the volumes are several order of magnitude greater than first expected. And it is when volumes are huge and over many years that alternative packaging technologies were supposed to be attractive. Or so the salesmen said, back when I was in this industry. The problem is, such visions never seemed to turn to reality.
With the relative few circuits on the board, the large on long term production runs and the supply chain controlled by Broadcom, it is strange that they have not gone for flip chip technology. Anyone knows why? Such technology was supposed to save the industry only a few years ago.