Comment by 🚀 stack
Re: "There are at least four Raspberry Pis in the house here...…"
Originally I was ver y excited about the Pi's, even though they were very slow. I thought that perhaps this would be the first stable, affordable mass-market platform since the days of Apple ][ and C64... You can hack a stable platform and know your code will work, instead of coding for the least common denominator for compatibility.
But no, they came out with a ton of variants, and now you can pick up a used PC cheaper (My goto machine is a Thinkpad 470 I got for $75)...
2024-09-09 · 2 years ago
25 Later Comments ↓
🌆 skyjake [OP...] · 2024-09-09 at 16:27:
I have to admit my excitement levels have been going down, too. I really like the 400 as an all-in-one computer, but the first time I saw the model 5 with its active cooler, it looked more like your regular PC than what I thought Raspi is all about: a low-power, passively cooled little computer. The model 5 uses a 27W power supply (!).
🚀 jsreed5 · 2024-09-10 at 01:21:
I also have four Pis, one of which used to host my capsule. In my opinion, the Raspberry Pi Foundation has lost sight of its original goal: affordable and simple low-power computing. Granted, I don't blame them for no longer being affordable, but they're steadily moving away from low-power, and they're definitely not as simple as they used to be. I do praise their efforts to keep Raspi OS usable on even their earliest devices though!
🦋 CarloMonte · 2024-09-10 at 14:09:
The Zero2W appears to be still true to the original goals of the Foundation.
🚀 stack · 2024-09-10 at 17:47:
My biggest issue is the insecure bootup via undocumented blob/GPU. Ultimately it is not possible to fully trust such a device with anything truly important.
☕️ Aptor-theHobbit [mod] · 2024-09-10 at 17:51:
Is it possible to trust any modern hardware ? Almost all of them have a blob firmware and microcodes. One execption may be the librebooted devices. I agree with @stack that open documentation on GPU at least on RPI would have been very nice for new models. If I recall correctly, they did release GPU docs for 3b and 3b+ and because of that openCL finally worked on RPI. If I am wrong any of these, please correrct me.
🔭 Sw4mp_Sl0th · 2024-09-10 at 21:23:
I share your sentiment skyjake. I've been using a Pi as a router (with OpenWRT) for a while now and the Pi shortage a few years ago led me to look for backup replacement alternatives. The Libre Computer (https://libre.computer/) SBCs ($35 USD Tritium ALL-H3-CC and $45 USD Renegade ROC-RK3328-CC) met that particular need nicely. The other Pi (a small server) I was hosting a few local services on for the family got replaced by an Intel Atom mini PC (Z83-F). Now that I've tried these devices I don't think I'll be going back to Pis anytime soon.
♊️ shtirlic · 2024-09-13 at 05:45:
While you are talking about big MCUs, I really found interesting small RP2040 and RP2350 in Pico 1/2 boards, especially the PIO approach for custom interfaces
🚀 mk270 · 2024-09-13 at 19:27:
The goal of the Raspberry Pi Foundation has never changed, and remains "to further the advancement of education of adults and children, particularly in the field of Computers, Computer Science and related subjects". This has always been a matter of public record.
Under UK charity and company law, the goal can only be changed with the consent of the Charity Commission.
It has never been about "affordable and simple low-power computing" and it would be illegal for the Foundation to prioritise this above being an educational charity.
🌆 skyjake [OP...] · 2024-09-14 at 12:02:
@mk270 That is correct, the Foundation is and remains a charity focused on education. My original comment was about the for-profit subsidiary responsible for designing the Raspberry Pi computers. That is the entity that was listed on the stock market recently. This can be very useful for raising funds, however in the longer term, the stock market can act as a negative incentive (see also: enshittification).
🚀 mk270 · 2024-09-14 at 14:01:
@skyjake Sorry, I do beg your pardon. I should have been clearer: I was intending only to respond to @jsreed5's point, which I quoted directly without it being explicit whom I was replying to.
🚀 jsreed5 · 2024-09-16 at 10:49:
"Goal" might have been the incorrect word on my part. You are correct that the stated goal of the Raspberry Pi Foundation has never changed. I meant to convey that ever since the early days, the foundation intended to implement their goals by creating simple, affordable, low-power computers--and that in my opinion, their current implementation doesn't quite resemble their original ideas. Their ideas on implementation are apparent in their early "About Us" page: https://web.archive.org/web/20120323154038/http://www.raspberrypi.org/about
🚀 mk270 · 2024-09-24 at 18:12:
Again, I don't really agree that "low-power" or "simple" came into it. It was only about "affordable", specifically, limiting the cost to $35, so that if the child somehow broke the device, it wasn't wrecking the parent's work machine, but wrecking something that many families could afford to replace.
I'd look at the business plan documents / prospectus circulated around the time of the IPO for where the trading company is going next - very informative.
🐼 erick · 2024-12-22 at 01:34:
I love the RPis, and also (currently) have a couple of them running at home, one is running home automation stuff, and the other one, a beefier RPi 5, is hosting among other things my GoToSocial and my Gemcapsule 🤓. Pretty sure I have a couple of ZWs and a RPi 5 I got as a hackathon price waiting for new ideas, or to be girted to some firend or family member.
👻 darkghost · 2024-12-27 at 02:19:
I'm a big fan of the 500 I just got. It's enough to run the fat web reasonably. No fans. Still uses the microSD cards.
🚀 stack · 2024-12-27 at 22:54:
Running a Web browser reasonably requires a ridiculous amount of CPU, so this is an accomplishment!
👻 darkghost · 2024-12-28 at 12:34:
The whole kit is a bit much. I already had a second hand monitor, SD card with rasp pi software, second hand mouse, previously purchased HDMI cable, and a 15W USB C power supply on hand. I think that's where it can make sense, when you can make use of something you already have or breathe life into something destined for the scrap heap. I love the form factor, but I grew up on an Atari 65XE and Amiga 500.
🚀 stack · 2024-12-28 at 20:20:
You can easily buy a used notebook with 10x processing power, or if you have a monitor, a used business computer even more powerful...
The reason to get a R.P. is low power consumption but it's going up rapidly, no fan noise which is no longer the case, price, also not happening...
Remaining advantages: form factor, access to gpios, and standardization of sorts...
RISC-V machines will soon take over. Especially since Chinese companies don't waste more than half of their budget on charitable activities and DEI. Wouldnt it be nice if Raspberry Pies were half-price?
👻 darkghost · 2024-12-28 at 22:14:
I'm clocking 2.1 watts at idle and 6.4 watts under load. Am I missing something? This seems pretty power efficient.
🚀 stack · 2024-12-29 at 00:39:
A modern AMD 'general use' is many times faster than an overclocked Raspberry Pi going full blast.
👻 darkghost · 2024-12-29 at 12:35:
@HansBrix Is this the power consumption at the plug or just for the CPU? My measurements were done with a watt meter at the plug for the whole computer, accessories and all.
@stack If a general purpose task is better accomplished using a higher speed, do that. I've found the pi line to be too slow for lots of general purpose tasks until the 500 (skipped the 5.) It's still pretty energy efficient and the 500 at least has no fans. That's all I'm saying. I'm running MX Linux on mine and it's fast enough to run Firefox/LibreWolf without being frustrating. Chromium was the choice because it was that much more efficient but now it's possible to not run chromium, which is very nice indeed.
🚀 stack · 2024-12-29 at 18:44:
Hey, I like the little Pis and own three. However I still have to find a good purpose for them. Too expensive and hard to maintain where microcontrollers would do and too expensive and slow for general purpose use. Maybe I will finally use it for my remote security cam system, aggregating data from a few esp32 cams.
just wanted to follow up, thanks to the AI bubble everythings gone up. pi 500+ is now £393.60 (twice the amount it was originally)
It's nuts. I just bought a Thinkpad with a p7, a terabyte M2 drive and 24GB RAM for under $200 US.
Why would anyone buy a raspberry pi?
💯 agree. I still like their picos and zeros. I do fear those are gonna go up in price too whilst this bubble goes on.
👻 darkghost · Apr 07 at 22:22:
I just made a bird feeder camera from a zero. Perfect board for something like that. But I can foresee the end of hobby SBCs.
Original Post
There are at least four Raspberry Pis in the house here... I've been a fan since the first generation. I hope they don't lose sight of their core values, though, with the recent IPO. I recall also hearing about some PR/community blunders recently, but such things can always occur as the business grows.