Ouf. Because I was a good girl and didn’t spend a lot of money in the last month, I was going to treat myself to the Ada Fruit kit today. Except with taxes, customs, international shipping, and conversion to Canadian currency, it was going to be around $100, so I backed out.
This. This is why I get so close to buying Raspberry Pis and then back out all the time. I need to find a domestic option.
Yesterday I read this:
And that made the Raspberry Pi Hole move up the “things to do” list for me.
I found a Pi 0 W (same kind Ada Fruit used for their kit), including power supply, for CAD $40 on Amazon. Since I currently have Prime to watch Man in the High Castle, and since I got a gift card for Yule, it was effectively free.
Now I need to dig up a suitable micro SD card from around the apartment and download an OS and Pi Hole to it. Sounds like a fun weekend project to me – if nothing glitches.
That still seems like a pretty sizable markup when I can pick one up locally for $5 US for just the Pi. $12 US gets me a power supply from the same place, but I could probably find one cheaper if I tried harder. Unfortunately, adding in shipping of at least $10 brings it pretty close to what you paid. 
On the other hand, this could be an interesting project for a group buy, assuming shipping doesn’t get out of hand…
My case arrived.
But I’m unimpressed that their idea of a driver for the screen is a custom .img file
Edit - Further digging found a GitHub for the driver
Welcome to the prices of the Great White North. The $40 was the cheapest, by far – non-Amazon prices were 50-100%+ of that.
The $40 makes it the same price as Adafruit, except I’ve got to supply my own microUSB and download the software and OS myself. No big deal.
Is there a reason you’re considering the Zero? They are pretty hard to find which is probably why you’re seeing such big markups.
Seems pretty reasonably priced and they are listed as an official retailer from raspberrypi.org.
I’ve already ordered the thing. It arrives tomorrow.
FYI I just searched on Raspberry Pi at first.
I’m basically copying the Ada Fruit kit. I do want wireless because running any more cables near my router would be a non-trivial exercise.
So, based on this thread, and the news about Chrome disabling adblockers, I went ahead and bought the stuff required to set this up. Worked easily and flawlessly. The only downside is that in blocking ads, it also blocks the ad networks that monetize ebates, so my wife is not on board. I know I can whitelist the networks to make it work, but that sounds like a maintenance nightmare. So, for the time being, it’s blocking ads for my desktop and nothing else on my network.
Mine is working…less than flawlessly. It gets partway through the setup, and then freezes. Then I have to reformat the SD card and try again.
I might cave in and get a San Disk brand SD card tomorrow.
Good to know. I’ve been wanting to get one for awhile but I thought it was a lot more complicated to pick parts and assemble than this thread reveals (I don’t do soldering or know much about low-level electronics or IC design, which the look of PI sites implies). So recently I’ve been thinking about getting one and trying it out, but I think my wife uses ebates too, so whitelisting might be something I’d need to consider too.
Anybody know if it blocks ads in streaming services (as in phone and roku apps) or if you have to exclude them for them to work?
if you only need to protect one device at a time, you can download this hosts file and install it in the appropriate system directory according to the instructions in the file
# This hosts file is brought to you by Dan Pollock and can be found at # http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/ # You are free to copy and distribute this file for non-commercial uses, # as long the original URL and attribution is included. # # See below for acknowledgements. # Please forward any additions, corrections or comments by email to # hosts@someonewhocares.org # Last updated: Fri, 25 Jan 2019 at 08:18:52 GMT # Use this file to prevent your computer from connecting to selected # internet hosts. This is an easy and effective way to protect you from # many types of spyware, reduces bandwidth use, blocks certain pop-up # traps, prevents user tracking by way of "web bugs" embedded in spam, # provides partial protection to IE from certain web-based exploits and # blocks most advertising you would otherwise be subjected to on the # internet. # There is a version of this file that uses 0.0.0.0 instead of 127.0.0.1 # available at http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/zero/. # On some machines this may run minutely faster, however the zero version # may not be compatible with all systems. # This file must be saved as a text file with no extension. (This means # that the file name should be exactly as below, without a ".txt" appended.) # Let me repeat, the file should be named "hosts" NOT "hosts.txt". # For Windows 9x and ME place this file at "C:\Windows\hosts" # For NT, Win2K and XP use "C:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" # or "C:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" # For Windows 7 and Vista use "C:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" # or "%systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" # For Windows 8 and Windows 10 use "C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts" # You may need to tell Windows Defender to ignore this path # see: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2764944 # You may have to use Notepad and "Run as Administrator" # # For Linux, Unix, or OS X place this file at "/etc/hosts" or on some # systems at "/private/etc/hosts". You will require root access to do # this. Saving this file to "~/hosts" will allow you to run something # like "sudo cp ~/hosts /etc/hosts". # For OS/2 copy the file to "%ETC%\HOSTS" and in the CONFIG.SYS file, # ensure that the line "SET USE_HOSTS_FIRST=1" is included. # For BeOS place it at "/boot/beos/etc/hosts" # On a Netware system, the location is System\etc\hosts" # For Macintosh (pre OS X) place it in the Mac System Folder or Preferences # folder and reboot. (something like HD:System Folder:Preferences:Hosts) # Alternatively you can save it elsewhere on your machine, then go to the # TCP/IP control panel and click on "Select hosts file" to read it in. # ------------------ # | As well, note that the format is different on old macs, so # | please visit http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/mac/ for mac format # For Android place the file at "/system/etc/hosts". You will need root # access on your device to do this. # ------------------ # To convert the hosts file to a set of Cisco IOS commands for Cisco routers # use this script by Jesse Baird: # http://jebaird.com/2012/12/21/hosts-to-ip-host-generating-blocked-hosts-from-a-host-file-for-a-cisco-router.html # If there is a domain name you would rather never see, simply add a line # that reads "127.0.0.1 machine.domain.tld". This will have the effect of # redirecting any requests to that host to your own computer. For example # this will prevent your browser from downloading banner ads, or sending # your information back to a company.
No soldering. If you have built your own pc, it should offer no challenges. It’s just a tiny motherboard.
So I may have got around the issue I was having.
What was happening was that I would get to the first or second screen of the NOOBS setup, and then the system would effectively freeze. Not really freeze, I suspect, just no mouse or keyboard.
By then NOOBS would have repartitioned the SD card, so I would have to repartition and reformat it and then copy NOOBS back again. It was a total pain.
Went through that twice, gave up, started to download the Raspian image, that froze and and refused to download.
Started again this morning, Raspian is downloading very slowly, so I poke around some more. NOOBS is now giving me an error message when I try to boot with it.
Poke around some more, and discover the error message happens when you reformat a disk without including a master boot record. This is supposedly difficult to do, but given I have to use gparted to fix the partitions after each attempt, it’s not surprising I managed it.
Meanwhile, I’ve been concerned about how the USB to the keyboard and mouse and the USB to the power supply have been not sharing real estate very well. The USB to the keyboard/mouse is just a little bit too wide to fit in the allocated space. It’s hard, brittle-type plastic though, and the power supply is rubbery and a little on the overengineered side, so I trim a little bit off with a pair of scissors (just where the USB part is – nowhere near any wires!).
And now it’s going through setup. Near as i can figure, the USB for the input devices was barely seated, and unseated itself during the install before.
And now I have to go out (figures), so I’ll just have to let it tick along on its own and see how it’s doing when I get back.
Got mine working! Once I managed to keep the keyboard & mouse plugged in long enough to get through setup, all the other issues went away.
It’s now living behind my TV set, doing its thing. I’m reading Cracked articles, just so I can marvel at how quickly even the photoplasties load.
So the page says to just “ssh into your machine,” but I can’t seem to do that… I tried connecting to the pi-hole ip, port 22, and I get a “connection refused” pop up. What am I doing wrong?
If you’ve installed pi-hole on Raspbian, you may need to enable ssh on it - a few years ago they changed things so ssh is disabled by default for security. If you’ve got a separate system that can read the SD card, you may be able to enable it by just creating an empty file called “ssh” in the boot folder.
[edit] Couple of alternative methods here: https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/remote-access/ssh/
[edit 2] Should have mentioned earlier, but if you enable ssh, it’s strongly recommended to change the password for the ‘pi’ user as soon as possible to make sure that step’s not forgotten.
I was able to enable ssh using your technique (worked flawlessly), and as soon as I logged in, I was prompted to change the password. Once done, I updated the pihole. Everything is a-ok. Thanks very much for your help.
This seems germane to this thread, since Pi Hole blocks the info gathering (and ads which result in that) without blocking the content sites.
How depressing. It’s almost as if resistance is futile.