If you have a Raspberry Pi 3B then this $45 deal becomes a full development platform.
Seems a great opportunity to jumpstart an Asmbly community around microcontrollers.
Buying these would provide a platform for a SIG, for classes, for collaborating on projects.
Food for thought … click here for details.
For the record, I bought one and look forward to playing with it. If others did too then perhaps we could meet up at the Space to discuss our ambitions. Seems a very good platform for developing RPi sensor-based applications.
At some point I have some project ideas that will require computer control of some motors and lights, so I will likely look at the Raspberry Pi then, but I have a thousand more practical projects I have to finish first.
Indeed an excellent platform for Raspberry Pi. When you buy a RPi single board computer the first thing you need is a display, keyboard, power supply, etc. With the Pi-top’s integrated form factor you don’t have to share desktop monitors and spend all your time swapping cables.
And you certainly can’t beat the price. Saw these when they were introduced but never pulled the trigger. I’m looking forward to doing lots of Pi stuff. I have many projects that need an SBC.
A thousand?! Eric and I will be waiting a while for you then! 
Someone I know is turning 11 and she really loves Legos. So I used this as an excuse and sprung for a pi-top[4] robitics kit. I want to do more STEM, try to engage her mind and perhaps even learn something. Anyone else in a similar boat? Interested in group projects with kids? I know it’s really hard to compete with tic tok lol.
BTW, just got an email saying ‘4-6 weeks’ on delivery on the pi-top[3]… So it gives me time to dig out my RaspberryPi3 and start coding again. I’m a hardware guy so software can be a struggle. But my first project is so simple. All I need to do is open a series of valves, in sequence, one at a time to flood multiple smaller grow beds in an aquaponic setup. This would result in a smaller total volume of water in the system and a smaller sump tank, i.e. more plants.
I have one of these Pi-tops that I haven’t done much with.
I was formerly a co-sponsor of an microcontroller Meetup that met at ATXhackerspace. We used Arduinos and esp8266s for it.
My go-to device is usually the esp8266 because it’s so cheap and has WiFi.
All that said, I’d be interested in meeting up and getting something going on the Pi-top. If @beirdo needs any help, or anyone else. I don’t think it needs to be a Pi-top, just any Raspberry Pi.
A project I’ve been wanting to get started on is a thermostat for my heat pump so I can control the data collection of how long the unit runs throughout the day, plot that along with the temperature setting and outside temperature. I was planning on using the esp8266 again, but could use the Pi.
@LeeDr, the ingredients of sensors gathering data over time using a microcontroller have so many applications. If your project was packaged into a meetup series then you could start a community around this project. You could create a sequence of meetings around this theme and educate about microcontrollers, sensors and coding while building your heat pump data collection system. It could be based on the “right microcontroller” for the job and the ESP8266 is often a good (cheap) choice.
Perhaps you’d like to gather a few member together to explore the idea?
