Hacker News Reader

You can get entire PCs way more powerful than any generation of Pi, with more connectivity/port options, for roughly the price of a pi + case, on eBay. It’s long been true that if you don’t need or want some of the particular characteristics or features of a Pi (compact size + GPIO, say), they’re not a great purchase.

View on HN

This is true is all you need is a cheap compute box. RPis give GPIO pins, compact size, and relatively low power usage. If you want something comparable, maybe an old mobile phone + a USB GPIO breakout board would fit the bill better.

It's not the same buying a new product from official supplier, to buying something old and/or used from an unknown entity on eBay.

Certified refurbishers usually sell fine machines, and give a year of guarantee, or so.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com