This Pi or That Pi?
Hey folks, tonight's update will be short but it will be big!
One Pi to Rule Them All
When the Mugsy Kickstarter launched, the latest and greatest Raspberry PI was the model 3B. This was the unit that we designed and budgeted around. So we were totally surprised when the beautiful folks at the Raspberry PI Foundation released the upgraded 3B+ right in the middle of our campaign!
It was love at first sight! Lots of our backer's were hoping that we could adjust the design and manufacturing plan to make sure Mugsy was built using the best Pi available. We had a couple of things we needed to overcome in order to make this happen:
- Limited availability at launch
- We calculated our volume discounts for the 3B into Mugsy's cost and the newer model would have no volume discounts. That means a higher price, with no way around it.
- Order quantity restrictions for tiny companies like Argyle Labs in order to guarantee the stock availability of resellers.
- Code compatibility testing
Mugsy, Powered by the PI 3B+
Well, no worries at all! We hustled and scribbled and cried(just a little), but we were able to make the best Pi work for the best Mugsy possible!
Check out Mugsy's beautiful brain:
Image courtesy of Make Magazine
Our first orders are in and we should have the first shipment at the shop before the end of the week. We will be doing 3 additional orders over the next 4 weeks to build up our inventory.
I am really pleased that we were able to upgrade such a major component without impacting our manufacturing plan. Special thanks goes out to our friends at community.heymugsy.com for keeping the fire burning on this. Luckily, a bunch of stars aligned at exactly the right time so we could make it happen.
At the end of the day, if it's good for Mugsy, it's good for you and me!
Thats it for now, thanks for the time.
Cheers,
-m