Online retailer Pi Supply has released a Raspberry Pi Zero W with a GPIO header. This is a boon for solder-averse hobbyists and lazy makers alike, especially as the pre-soldered Pi costs only £14.

Pi Supply owner Aaron Shaw tells us, “We think the Raspberry Pi Foundation absolutely did the right thing by not including a header as standard because it’s unnecessary for many projects and adds a significant cost! However, for some projects, this is an annoyance and a header is needed.”

Pre-soldered Pi Zero W with GPIO pins

Shaw says that pre-soldering the GPIO header “turns the Pi Zero into something completely plug and play, the minute it falls through the post box. And we test them before they ship out.”

We wondered who was doing all the laborious soldering: “For the first 100 units, we did these by hand between four of us… we have now outsourced it to our lovely contract manufacture partners based in the UK.”

The pre-soldered Pi was first listed on 12 May and “they have been selling fantastically well.” Pre‑soldered or not, you can still only buy one Pi Zero W per order.

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