Sep 24, 2014 | By Alec

While we've already seen a few simple 3D printed computers around the web, a London-based team of young entrepreneurs and engineers have realized something truly amazing: Recently, they have revealed the prototype for their Raspberry Pi laptop, the world's first ever fully-functional, 3D printed laptop. This impressive feat debuted on Reddit a few days ago, to understandable acclaim.

Perhaps even more impressive, the team behind this inspiring creation intends to develop a do-it-yourself kit that will allow everyone to print their very own laptop. The team plans to launch a Kickstarter campaign in the near future to gather funds to realize these plans.

Their kit will, aptly, be called the Pi-Top, as the laptop runs on a Raspberry Pi board computer. It is to include all the materials and components you need (and that you can't print yourself) and a comprehensive guide to printing all the necessary remaining parts. Furthermore, the team behind the Pi-Top also intend to offer thorough lesson plans to educate both children and adults on software and hardware programming.

The Pi-Top prototype was realized with a Rostock Max V2 3D printer, one of the largest consumer-grade printers currently available. The laptop casing and shell was printed in PLA filament and took a whopping 160 hours to complete.

Various comments revealed that the printing process was – understandably – complicated and featured many obstacles, like live swapping of filament rolls. Various support features needed to be incorporate to give this thin creation some rigidity. They shared the following printing details on Reddit:

Printer used: Rostock Max V2 kit – with E3D full metal hotend
Filament: PLA 1.75mm
Nozzle: 205
Bed temp: 55°C
Speed: 70mm/sec
Print time: 3 prints total (two pieces together and the two larger pieces separately) roughly 160 hours of printing
Support settings: KISSlicer with medium support, at 45 Degrees with a horizontal gap (from object) of 1mm
De-string Settings: Prime 5.5mm Suck: 5.4mm Wipe:5mm Z-lift: 1mm

What can the Pi-Top do, you ask? Well, the current prototype – though the same will be true for the kits they hope to develop – has a fully Wi-Fi capability, a battery life of up to eight hours, and comes with a 13,3" screen and a fully functional keyboard. The laptop runs on Raspberry Pi's Raspbian Operating System.

While few specifics are as of yet known about what this computer can do, the team have implied that it will mainly function as a teaching tool that will demonstrate all the basics surrounding hardware and software programming. And of course, Raspberry Pi is above intended for those functions. They have already tested its teaching abilities on a group of IT-illiterate Birmingham students.

In the future however, they also hope to include tutorials on 3D printing and customization: 'The Pi-Top kit is just the start. Our future projects will see you modifying the Pi-Top using everything you've learnt and gaining the skills to create your own products. At this stage, you will be designing your own components and products.'

Sadly, however, we will have to patiently wait for the Pi-Top's Kickstarter to learn about this thrilling and ground-breaking innovation. We will keep you updated as soon as more information surfaces.



Posted in 3D Printers

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robyinno wrote at 11/16/2016 1:01:44 AM:

Where we can find the 3d cad files for 3d print the Pi-Top? thanks!

richdude wrote at 10/8/2014 7:36:06 AM:

Eh its ok make more stuff but i donated your company $150 im a rich dude but u didnt make print Curve Tv bahh

Harry wrote at 10/8/2014 7:33:48 AM:

I have a Pi-Top, they work brilliantly. So far I have printed a laptop for each of my kids, one for me and my wife and 3 iPhone 5 cases. Thanks Pie-Top, I owe you heaps! I hope you start developing something that prints more Pi-Tops!



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