NEW PRODUCTS – @ArrowDotCom Packs: Raspberry Pi Arcade Cabinet / Pi Powered Times Square Traveler / RasPi DIY Camera

from NEW PRODUCTS – @ArrowDotCom Packs: Raspberry Pi Arcade Cabinet / Pi Powered Times Square Traveler / RasPi DIY Camera
by Daniel Nosonowitz

Adafruit Arrow iso box ORIG

NEW PRODUCTS – @ArrowDotCom Packs: Raspberry Pi Arcade Cabinet / Pi Powered Times Square Traveler / RasPi DIY Camera


In anticipation of the holiday season (and beyond!), we’ve once again partnered with our good friends at Arrow Electronics to release custom packs of fun Raspberry Pi-centered projects! Three packs are available for users with varying interests in electronics. Not only would these steal the show as gifts at your holiday party, they’re also great if you’re simply looking to embark on a new project or satisfy your Maker impulses.

3272 kit ORIG

First off, we have the Raspberry Pi Arcade Cabinet Pack. Couldn’t get one of those Nintendo Mini Classic consoles? No problem, we’ve got you covered with this no-solder no-tools required kit! Video games are one of the most popular applications for the Raspberry Pi (and one of the best gifts to get over the holidays). Play NES, Sega, MAME, SNES, Atari and more!

Thanks to the easy-to-use Raspberry Pi and some clever software, you can recreate the classic arcade experience at home. Adafruit will bring the genuine “clicky” arcade controls and instructions, while you use your crafting skills to build the unit and supply your desired game files. There are a number of gaming OSes to choose from like RetroPie, PiPlay, Recalbox, and Lakka to name a few. Classic game emulation used to require a well-spec’d PC and specialized adapters for the controls, so it’s exciting to see this trickle down to a Raspberry Pi powered gaming experience. You can then use our awesome retrogame software to turn the joystick + buttons into a “keyboard” for that authentic arcade experience.

Kit includes:

We also have a learn guide that’ll get you gaming in no time!

Note: Fully built arcade control box not included. This kit requires either 3D printing your own enclosure or cutting one from acrylic. The case or box should be at least 50mm (2 inches) deep to accommodate the buttons and solderless connectors. Any workable material will do – even a cigar box!

3273 kit ORIG

Next we have the Pi Powered Times Square Traveler Pack. Some people might want to make the trek to NYC. But for those who want to skip out on the crowds and the cold, why not bring a little bit of the Big Apple into your home with this Times Square Traveler Pack?

These screens are the very same that line the billboards of NYC. With Adafruit’s best selling RGB Matrix HAT, anyone can take a shot at creating a beautiful scrolling display to rival those found in Times Square.

The included Matrix HAT is our finest to date, full of some really great circuitry. Let’s break it down:

  • Simple design – plug in power, plug in IDC cable, run our Python code!
  • Power protection circuitry – you can plug a 5V 4A wall adapter into the HAT and it will automatically protect against negative, over or under-voltages! Yay for no accidental destruction of your setup.
  • Onboard level shifters to convert the RasPi’s 3.3V to 5.0V logic for clean and glitch free matrix driving
  • DS1307 Real Time Clock can keep track of time for the Pi even when it is rebooted or powered down, to make for really nice time displays

Kit includes:

Some soldering is required to assemble the RGB Matrix HAT – make sure you have a soldering iron and solder so you can attach the headers onto it!

Check out our RGB Matrix HAT learn guide for help getting started!

3275 kit ORIG

Finally, there’s the Raspberry Pi DIY Camera Pack. If the holidays promise anything, it’s almost certainly a deluge of photographs. Instead of taking out your smartphones, why not build your own camera?

With one of Adafruit’s best selling screens and an official Raspberry Pi camera, you’ll be ready to set up your very own digital camera in no time at all. You’ll be immortalizing all those great memories and get to show off your maker skills in the process.

The included camera board is a high quality 8 megapixel Sony IMX219 image sensor custom designed add-on board specifically for the Raspberry Pi, featuring a fixed focus lens. It’s capable of 3280 x 2464 pixel static images, and also supports 1080p30, 720p60, and 640x480p90 video. It attaches to the Pi by way of one of the small sockets on the board’s upper surface and uses the dedicated CSi interface, designed especially for interfacing to cameras.

View what you’ve captured on the accompanying 2.8″ display with 320×240 16-bit color pixels and a resistive touch overlay. The TFT plate uses the high speed SPI interface on the Pi and can use the mini display to show your images and video. Best of all it plugs in right on top of the Pi!

Kit includes:

Check out our WiFi Pi Camera guide for instructions on how to turn this into your very own little camera that saves the images to your DropBox. The version you’ll make will have to stay plugged in, since we don’t include a battery pack (you can pick up a battery pack here if you want to take the camera out and around) Also, since you’re using our existing enclosure, thread the Pi Camera cable through the HDMI slot right above the HDMI connector.

All three packs can be found in the Adafruit shop!

If we’re out of stock on adafruit.com, head on over to Arrow Electronics!

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