pi-top: Laptop made from a Raspberry Pi

Second Impression

In terms of operation, the pi-top first had to prove itself with a Raspberry Pi 2 (RPi2) that runs with a pre-installed and updated Raspbian. In this test, the LXDE interface built into the pi-top was not able to use the entire display screen. Almost a quarter of the right side of the screen remained black, even when I tried to adjust the resolution both in the desktop interface and by entering corresponding specifications in config.txt.

Once XFCE was installed from the source packages, the situation became much better. After switching to this desktop, I could easily change the resolution in the settings. In spite of these changes, the system was still not able to recognize the correct resolution automatically. A freshly installed Raspbian "jessie" started with the correct resolution, but the black edge reappeared on reboot and then remained regardless of any attempts at correction. As expected, applications with higher graphics performance requirements, such as FreeCAD, ran speedily with the OpenGL drivers.

In addition to the display, the keyboard is also limited in terms of its usefulness. For one thing, it does not respond each time a key is pressed. Furthermore, those who do not use a UK or US qwerty keyboard will have problems. My test device has a UK English keyboard layout, which I was able to localize for German after a fashion by retrofitting the keyboard with adhesive labels. The layout reverses the position of the Y and Z keys, something that German users find familiar. However, the keyboard is missing a number of things, such as an individual key for the backslash. An external keyboard connected to the device makes things easier, although I don't consider this to be a genuine solution for the shortcomings.

pi-topOS

An alternative operating system is pi-topOS [4], which the manufacturer delivers along with the device. This operating system is based on Raspbian, but it contains a series of changes that serve to optimize it for use with the Rasp Pi notebook. Nonetheless, pi-topOS displays signs of immaturity.

The login screen opens once the system boots; however, it is not possible to add a new user or sign in with the information received from the manufacturer when the device was ordered. Apparently, the connection to the pi-top server fails. The login procedure can be interrupted by pressing one of the pi-top keys on either side of the spacebar, which allows the standard user pi-top to log in to the system.

As would be expected with a laptop, pi-topOS supports the entire power management, including the state of charge and turning off the system during shutdown or when the on/off switch is pressed for longer than three seconds. When delivered, the system only communicates in English, but it is easy to install a desired language package through package administration. Pi-topOS uses 5.9GB of the 8GB memory card, so you don't have much room left over for user data, as I found out with the application FreeCAD [5], which I used together with the OpenGL driver of the Rasp Pi [6] for testing (Figure 3).

Figure 3: The manufacturer provides pi-topOS, which is a Raspbian system that has been adapted to the pi-top laptop.

Installing and configuring the OpenGL driver turned into a stumbling block. The pi-top booted after restart but only in slow motion, and it never got to the desktop. After contacting pi-top support, I learned that pi-topOS does not yet support OpenGL. I managed to get the configuration settings for the OpenGL driver from the config.txt of another computer.

The system now booted faster, but to start the desktop, I again had to go into raspi-config. Pieces of the power management had gone missing as well. For example, the Rasp Pi remained powered during shutdown, which meant that the LEDs continued to shine. The problem was rectified by re-installing the pi-top image on the memory card.