Ship dates?

My Newark (US) order just got bumped from 2 Apr to 16 Aug. :'-(

Hi there - we found out the cause for this jump to August - it was a system auto-generated error from our website to Newark element14 customers.  So sorry for this confusing messaging.   We've recently posted a discussion regarding the specifics of the issue here: http://www.element14.com/community/thread/17532. 

Additionally, Raspberry Pi Foundation has communicated about this issue as well:

https://twitter.com/#!/Raspberry_Pi/status/185128191529193473

Thanks,

Nicole

Thank you for your responses and updates, Nicole.

It's a breath of fresh air in a project that is suffering greatly from lack of official communications.  Given good information, communities are generally very tolerant and understanding of delays, so this helps a lot.

Morgaine.

I noted that the "lead time" estimate on the RPi item page at Newark has reverted to Aug 17th again.  Moreover, it used to have "stock arriving" in April and "additional stock" in August.  Now both dates are in August.

It appears more and more that even the lucky few in the first 10k probably won't see theirs until August.  So where does that leave the other 100k+ people who want one?

I'm becoming less and less enthusiastic when I hear that the first 2k just arrived in the UK and that the other 8k (remainder of the 10k) are just finishing production. I'm sure I'm not the only one that understood that around 29 Feb 10k RPi had been built.  Now we hear that only around 2k had been completed.

Why can't we hear what the "big plan" is?  We all know that there have been issues...ethernet port...compliance testing...but someone at the two companies must have some plan.  Negotiations for future orders, packaging and shipping, redistribution through their reseller chains, etc.  According the the compliance testing post at the RaspberryPi.org site, RS has people on site in China to watch the production and testing.  I can't believe that a UK company would have people travel to China (can't be cheap) without a firm plan on how they will procure and sell this product. 

For the sake of our sanity, can't someone "official" provide a real update laying out the whole plan?

Rather colourfully, it's called mushroom management, a very well known principle:  "Keep them in the dark, feed them ***, and watch them grow."  The Foundation is proving really proficient at it, and the fanbois don't even realize how they're being farmed.  It's really rather funny to watch, but I'd much prefer open and honest information and a professional relationship with the community than comedy.

So unfortunately, no "Big Plan" for you, that would conflict with the key tenets of mushroom management.

Leaving the Foundation's silliness aside, it's pretty easy to guess what Farnell and RS's "Big Plan" is though, now that we know that they've demanded full certification:  They want to manufacture the boards in large volume and take our money as fast as possible.  They're taking a professional approach by insisting on certification, since these boards will end up in normal consumer homes and that's the law in both EU and US.  The fact that the Foundation is blaming the companies for the delay when they're acting more professionally than they is really quite mind-boggling, but par for the course where the Foundation is concerned.  They blame everyone except themselves.

It does make for amusing threads though.

And a more or less instant ban if you mention it anywhere near the Foundation's forums.

I am no expert in this, you and others seem to have a lot more knowledge and experience than me, but just applying some common sense, I can't understand how certification wasn't done when it is / was obvious these were going into normal homes and schools.

Surely the Foundation must have realised this, with the people they have on board, after all we have been assured several times that they 'know what they are doing'

Please keep up. The issue was that at this stage the Pi was considered a development board for geeks and nerds. The certification would have come later with the cased, boxed model for consumers

My guess:  they're good engineers, but they're terrible planners, failed to get professional advice on matters of law and regulation, and are totally unskilled at public relations judging by the forum mess.  I just hope this rather bad cocktail doesn't derail getting Rpi into education, because we really do need it.  I know that from personal experience in academia.

@bob: Don't fall for that Foundation excuse, it makes zero sense.  The 10k of the first batch is a lot of boards, and a large proportion of them are going into normal homes as consumer devices, not restricted to electronics engineers or radio amateurs.  And these boards are being SOLD, not handed out to testers for pre-release checking.  The odd dozen boards might be able to escape consumer regulations on the grounds of being prototypes, but not 10k, that's a full production release.  The community is being sold a bridge there.

PS.  I have loads of microcontroller development boards here, purchased as products.  They're all fully certified.

The RPi Foundation likes the "10k dev boards no certification" myth, and they said "we took legal advice".

So I -had- to point out that they needed to "get legal advice somewhere else", since "your credibility is taking a hit". That was a mistake!

Now, I  think their credibility is long gone (right now I only trust their partners), but seems like I need to be "lawyer specialising in this area" to comment on such a matter. Who are they kidding?

Maybe saying them I had my share with certifications stuff made me a troll, and it seems I achieved a nice ban. Where's the "community" in that? Maybe I should've posted professional references?

Funny enough, I know  what happens without so called "compliance testing" and "certifications", and if this causes a late ship, well I'm 100% with Farnell (or RS) regarding this matter (I blame the Foundation); I think nobody wants the RPi halted at some customs for some random reason, right? Because that's what would have happened in at least 5 EU nations.

Sorry if I rant here, but  here I could say what I think, clearly,  and no one accused me of -some internet slang stuff here-; maybe here we are more like customers than overage kids in a power trip?

Long live to the old good profit business model, for god sake!

On the bright side, if the manufacturing is -like they say- licensed to Farnell and RS, this should reduce their (Foundation) presence and put the whole thing in more competent hands, which will be good for sure.

The RPi Foundation likes the "10k dev boards no certification" myth, and they said "we took legal advice".

So I -had- to point out that they needed to "get legal advice somewhere else", since "your credibility is taking a hit". That was a mistake!

Now, I  think their credibility is long gone (right now I only trust their partners), but seems like I need to be "lawyer specialising in this area" to comment on such a matter. Who are they kidding?

Maybe saying them I had my share with certifications stuff made me a troll, and it seems I achieved a nice ban. Where's the "community" in that? Maybe I should've posted professional references?

Funny enough, I know  what happens without so called "compliance testing" and "certifications", and if this causes a late ship, well I'm 100% with Farnell (or RS) regarding this matter (I blame the Foundation); I think nobody wants the RPi halted at some customs for some random reason, right? Because that's what would have happened in at least 5 EU nations.

Sorry if I rant here, but  here I could say what I think, clearly,  and no one accused me of -some internet slang stuff here-; maybe here we are more like customers than overage kids in a power trip?

Long live to the old good profit business model, for god sake!

On the bright side, if the manufacturing is -like they say- licensed to Farnell and RS, this should reduce their (Foundation) presence and put the whole thing in more competent hands, which will be good for sure.

I also won the troll ban, they don't like at all people that post comments criticizing what they do and have a dedicated and devoted group of minions to answer questions that nobody asked, generate additional smoke clouds around lame excuses and cry wolf that are not being paid for the job they do.

The RPi was a great idea but profit or non-profit they really failed to execute on their promise, and always blaming somebody else for their shortcomings.

As a development prototype the board doesn't look bad, but if the actual boards are exactly like the ones being posted around and the layout artwork made public is the actual one, I can easily identify several design flaws, but don't even try to point them because you will get exterminated by the minions.

I'm almost sure that after the initial batch the distributors will ask for a proper redesign.

Shame, it was a good proposition to have an ARM based simple Linux board for $35, and I concur with the same feeling that credibility is gone.

My apologies also for the rant.

Oh I forgot that! You could criticize the board itself too! Life for RPF detractor is so harsh...

Well you haven't been troll banned here - so - why not let me know where you feel the design flaws are - and something positive can come out of it.  Would hate to miss anything on a re-design.  For sure the volume manufacturers will ask for changes - and they have been offered whatever they feel they need.  Development never stops or with the current issues - sleeps.

If you would like some hi-res pics just let me know.

Pete

Well, I'm interested in that too, I'd like to know what kind of design flaw you've seen.

I can point out ethernet and usb misalignement, or the lack of mounting holes on the pcb, but I don't think those alone are things requiring a redesign.

OK - alignment of USB and Ethernet - absolutely fair cop, I've already commented in several places that that is an issue (and my fault/decision). It's not easy to move the USB inboard by much without ripping up the SMSC.  Best plan may be to move the Ethernet out a bit.  Several case designs I've seen make a feature of this (thanks guys).

As for the mounting holes - we had planned (probably without enough consideration) that the PCB would clip into it's final case, again we have case designs that do this and a really neat and cheap one that you screw to something and then clip the RPi in.  It's also a bit of a challenge to get holes in the board, you need a keep out area for tracks and inner layers to stop crushing of important stuff if anyone gets over enthusiastic with a screwdriver.  Works out about 7-8mm diameter.

Big issue for developers - no reset button - discussed at length and a wrong call, power down works the same way but puts wear stress on the USB or your power socket.  If only it was to a pin on the GPIO port.........

None of these are as you say are show stoppers requiring us to redesign the PCB, but if the partners need changes I think I will do what I can to fix these.  I will give as much warning of impending changes as I can, but I can feel the 'maintain compatibility' straight jacket closing in.

Interested in all suggestions.

I think we have gone off topic here so I'll start a new thread "Raspberry Pi - Hardware Flaws and Fixups?" - please continue there.

Pete

Well well, what a turn-up for the books.

The alleged "community" site at RPF turns into a police state where reasonable discussion is not tolerated if it is critical, while this commercial site ends up being the venue for open and constructive discussions with developers, as people can speak freely here.  I'm almost tempted to drop Eben a frank private email about it, but I think it's too late now.  Short of removing 90% of current admins as well as the primary official agitator, that site is now terminal. .

@PeteL: Thank you for being open and understanding that improvements benefit a lot from reasonable criticism.  It's something that all engineers appreciate.  Excellent idea on the dedicated thread for hardware changes.

Morgaine.

Thanks for you input. (I believe it's never to late - so go ahead but please be understand that he and Liz get way more emails every day than it is realistically possible to read let alone answer - I'll forward this post pair).

I'm not going to get into specifics, because I cannot (I don't have the information).  We have no context as to why someone got banned and the assumption that it was for reasonable discussion is IMO a bit of a stretch but you are equally entitled to your point of view.

I'm an electronic engineering kind of person, way more hardware than software. I like to build useful things that work but don't always get it right/perfect, I have a brilliant team of engineers I can call on, along with engineers from companies I have worked with over the years, the community gives an opportunity to extend that reach which is great.

Constructive criticism (I always felt input sounded nicer) for me is always the way forward although I know many 'visionaries' that have been very autocratic but it's their way of just getting it done (one sadly missed one springs to mind).  If folks keep it civil, argued and ideally helping with the overall goal I'll do what I can to answer/discuss.  Rants, angst and just plain old trolling for the sake of it will just cause me to ignore them or for e14 to moderate them away but they are light touch as far as I can see.

Pete

Agree 100%.

But I've lost any further interest in pleading again for admin restraint over there though.  It's now a total waste of time, because intolerance has been given official backing on the blog.  There's no escape from that.

Better to focus here on technology and leave them to it.  I just hope the terrible reputation that they're earning doesn't bring the board's reputation down with it, as Eben is totally correct that school-level technical education needs it.  I witnessed myself the disastrous collapse of intake standards in our yearly intake (EE+CSc), so bad that we had to organize remedial courses to bring kids up to a level where they could even understand our 1st year EE material.  It was depressing.  But it made me an instant supporter as soon as I heard of Eben's goals.

piovrauze wrote:

Because that's what would have happened in at least 5 EU nations.

I live in the EU. We have a "shengen" agreement. This makes it illegal for nations to check persons and/or goods at the internal borders. If they don't conform, they should've been stopped by british customs.

(on the other hand, maybe the UK opted out of shengen, because they don't trust the rest of us doing border patrol meaning we're supposed/allowed to check again stuff/people coming from UK to EU mainland).

My bad, "customs" wasn't the better choice of words. Still, merchandise from UK and US is checked (legally), and expecially China based merchandise are checked for counterfeits and dangerous/illegal imports/triangulation and custom evasion, so for the RPi "customs" may be an issue. What was thinking was the case of someone getting a non certified RPi , and giving to the right gov organs the tip about "illegal device"; this would cause an halt on the seller side, and on import side too (ence my use of customs, pertinent in my nation). This can happen even for a missing translation on the label on a food can. Since I don't wan't this to happen, and I really fear the RPF blog can lead to this, I'm pleased that we are doing those compliance tests.

Btw, as it is possible for a dangerous good (fake CE mark) to enter a state (ok, there shouldn't be frontiers in most EU now), the opposite is possible too, to stop a perfectly conformant product, or delay it, with concrete damage for both seller and customer. I live in EU btw, when I said "5 EU nations" it's because for others I don't know.

Sorry if my english isn't that good, and my phrasing sometimes becames obscure, I always have difficulties explaining "specialized" topics in other languages.