Comment by qwerty456127 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by qwerty456127 | Hacker News Reader

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I actually wish there was a more powerful Raspberry PI.

Whenever you say you want more powerful the answer is the current way it's primary goal is to be affordable and its primary target audience are schools etc.

E.g. The standard version of the Pi 400 with 4 GB covers most (consumer / school children / students) application purposes. 8 GB are rather needed in the area of video editing / prosumer / server, and would bring the price significantly above the „magic“ 100 € limit.[1]

The vendor just doesn't want to acknowledge the real role of Raspberry Pi is not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board anymore, it has became a standard (for an ARM PC and a hackable set-top-box/console in particular) and a vibrant ecosystem has grown around it - there are plenty reasons to still want a Raspberry Pi original (rather than something the competitors offer) when you don't need it to be so cheap (or even so small) but actually need more power, faster IO, more ports, more GPIO pins etc.

[1] https://pi3g.com/2020/11/04/will-the-raspberry-pi-400-be-ava...

> The vendor just doesn't want to acknowledge the real role of Raspberry Pi is not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board anymore

The vendor is a charity with a mission that they have chosen [1]. They can target the Pi however they want to meet that mission. The fact that it doesn't happen to do something that you want it for is your problem not theirs.

There has been a virtuous cycle that something originally aimed at education has been of use to so many hackers, resulting in high volumes and all the benefits that brings. But that doesn't mean that they also need to focus on other sectors.

[1] https://www.raspberrypi.org/about/

>> The vendor just doesn't want to acknowledge the real role of Raspberry Pi is not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board anymore

> The vendor is a charity with a mission that they have chosen. They can target the Pi however they want to meet that mission.

I don't say they can't, I say that doesn't really reflect the actual reality. Many people buy it just because it's THE thing and a somewhat uniform standard so it's easier to target and to benefit from the existing ecosystem around it.

This also is a real role among those Raspbery PI plays in the real world. This is a fact the vendor marketing seemingly ignores - such is the meaning of my statement.

I don't judge them or demand anything.

"The vendor" is a foundation that has education at the center of its charter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi_Foundation

They are not doing this for profit, although they are self-financing at this point (from what I've read).

Ostensibly, yes. But consider that Eben Upton is an ex-Broadcom guy that helped build videocore and that they get everything at cost, and it looks like an incredibly powerful PR move for Broadcom with side benefits.

Well, I like to think the better of people. I don't know Eben, but he comes across (in what he wrote and I've seen him speak) as honest, unassuming and set on the mission (even if he is now running the commercial side).

I'd give some minor portion of my anatomy to be part of something like the Raspberry Pi project and make some sort of difference (even if it might be seen as pandering to geeky tinkerers rather than helping schoolchildren, it's still one of the most fun and rewarding things I can envision as an engineer).

I typically do, too, but the Pi4 compute module and board are all too eerily similar to a product my team demoed to Eben at CES... right down to the MCO for the port layouts, form factor, and the high-density module interconnects.

For about 2x the price of the Raspberry Pi 4 8GB model, I can buy a significantly more powerful X86 solution, in terms of compute and I/O.

Compared to that, what would make you go for a Pi at that price point?

What would you recommend in the x86 space?

I haven't actually purchased it myself so can't recommend as such, but for example the Biostar A10N-8800E looks[2] interesting.

Has a quad core AMD APU, 2x DDR4 DIM sockets, PCIe 3.0 x16 slot, one M key M.2 slot, 2x SATA, 2x USB 3.1 Gen 1.

Board itself with integrated CPU costs just ~20% more than the Raspberry Pi 4 8GB, at least here in Norway. Add in 8GB of value memory and a small/spare PSU and you should be not far off the 2x mark.

[1]: http://www.biostar-usa.com/app/en-us/mb/introduction.php?S_I...

[2]: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/biostar-a10n-8800e/

No GPIOs there, though.

Sure, but the post I replied to specifically said

> The vendor just doesn't want to acknowledge the real role of Raspberry Pi is not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board anymore

To me, tinkering means GPIO.

That's why I was asking why the want for a Raspberry Pi, why not get something else that already exist. I'm curious what they're looking for. Of course if they still want GPIO then that's a valid point.

> not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board anymore

being not limited to being a cheap tinkerer board doesn't mean not being a [slightly less cheap] tinkerer board among the rest of roles. I didn't mean I don't need GPIO. I actually want more GPIO so I could connect a "hat", an infrared port, a cooler and still have spare pins for actual tinkering.

Another cool thing available exclusively with Raspberry Pi is polished Raspbian OS coming with free Mathematica and other goodies.

Hardware codecs also feels nice and, AFAIK, you don't get them with x86.

At last but not at least (this arguably is the most valuable part actually) it is THE SBC. This means it's easy and efficient to target for a developer (incl hardware developers) and easy and efficient to share problems and solutions for the community.

Ah, fair enough.

> At last but not at least (this arguably is the most valuable part actually) it is THE SBC.

I'm not sure a significantly more expensive, but more powerful, Raspberry Pi would have the same market appeal. Then again, what do I know :)

> 2x USB 3.1 Gen 1.

USB 3.1 Gen 1 means simple USB 3.0, right?

Well yes but they couldn't just call it that, now could they?

Any of the Udoo boards, most specifically the x86 Advanced Plus II. Plenty of GPIOs from the Braswell core, and another chunk from an integrated Arduino.

Its a bit more than 2x the price, but the flexibility and standard boot and peripherals it offers is worth the cost for hobbiest hacks.

Well... No one is stopping you from pulling the Beowulf maneuver. I.e., duct-taping a couple together. Via UART/USB/I2C/Ethernet.

It isn't as sexy or prone to looking cool, but technically it is possible. I'm actually planning on trying to tinker a traditionally networked cluster that I?m going to evolve to an attempt at an SSI'd cluster.

That's really all what most Integrated Circuits are going to mowadays. Just take a few ALU's, clock circuits, register files, Memory, some caches, a few MMU's, connect it all with buses, fab x gang bustahs and you've got a new system. The toughest part seems to be getting someone to be frank with you and just giving you an accurate datasheet/not screwing you with locked down firmware and rent extractiom arramgements.

You could get akready packaged solution

https://www.picocluster.com/collections/raspberry-pi

if only there were a bunch of other sbcs that had different performance and price levels available...

oh wait just buy a khadas vim3 or the new tinkerboard etc etc

Do these support Raspberry Pi hats (e.g. the TV hat) and OSes (e.g. Raspbian)? I've read the software/compatibility part of Raspberry Pi alternatives (incl. those from big brands) is very bad. Perhaps this is not the case with Khadas, I hardly know anything about this brand.

Depends on the 40-pin peripheral layout. The tinkerboard doesnt run Raspbian, but instead runs ASUS' own OS.

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