admin Posted on 3:41 pm

Raspberry Pi: is it mainstream or niche?

The original Raspberry Pi, a $ 35 mini computer released in early 2012, sparked a technological revolution. For half the cost of a new console video game, an inventor, programmer and developer or gamer could choose a Pi and customize it to do whatever they wanted. Although it is not the first hobby board computer available, its wide base of support and the ability to run a wide variety of Linux distributions made it far more successful than its predecessors.

Despite all its success, the Pi was initially limited to only the most curious and intelligent geeks. Its modest single-core chip was painfully slow when performing many common tasks. Even simple web pages took a while to load and took up what little available RAM. While you could use the Pi as a computer, which attracted the interest of mainstream users, it was not a very capable unit. As a result, the Pi only caught on with hobbyists.

However, the sequel to the brilliant Pi is a major upgrade. The 700MHz single-core processor has been upgraded to a 900MHz quad-core chip and the RAM has gone from 256MB / 512MB to 1GB.

Given this, can the new Pi 2 be used as a computer? Hmm.

Starting with Pi

The Raspberry Pi, while really accessible for users with modest computing skills, still has a learning curve. The $ 35 price itself is possibly misleading, as it doesn’t include everything you need to make the device work. No power adapter, no microSD card, and not even a case. All of that must be purchased separately.

This is not a plug-and-play device

So how much does it really cost to start using a Pi 2? Well, I bought a power adapter for $ 9, a 16GB microSD card for $ 6, and a keyboard and mouse for $ 18. A case cost another $ 8, which isn’t required, but it’s nice to have if you’re traveling. In total, therefore, the final price (without monitor) is around $ 75. Not bad, sure, but it’s more than double the MSRP of $ 35.

We configured the Raspberry Pi 2 with the standard NOOBS ISO installation. Users can buy a card with it preloaded, but we decided to upload the image ourselves. The process took approximately 20 minutes, most of which was spent waiting for the files to transfer. Once transferred, simply connect all the cables and turn on the device. You should see the famous Raspberry Pi logo appear once it is connected to a monitor.

If that was the end of the installation, things would be too good to be true. Raspbian comes with only a few programs installed, and while they provide quite a bit of functionality, they lack some of the more advanced bells and whistles. The Pi store, for example, is a bit of a disappointment. You never actually succeeded in installing and launching an application. We had to use commands like “sudo apt-get install libreoffice-writer” to complete the installation and launch. This is not too advanced even for some of the newer users, but it does require a bit of knowledge.

Other errors include incorrect detection of my monitor’s native resolution, a DNS issue that prevented me from loading web pages from my router, and disappointing page rendering times. I was able to troubleshoot and optimize these issues, but by then a few hours had slipped away.

Next …

Once set up, I was a bit surprised how the Pi 2 made up for lost time. It was so easy to use and it kept reminding me how much value there is for $ 75.

I was even quite surprised by how well the Pi 2 handled tasks in GIMP. 720p and 1080p image editing was never unreasonably choppy, it was actually smooth. While certain complex actions take several seconds to complete, the overall experience was much more pleasant than you might imagine.

More than a hobby?

Can you say that the Pi 2 is for general use? Or is it more suitable for developers, programmers, engineers, and others? Unfortunately, if one can find a used PC from a trusted vendor, they can only spend more dollars to get a PC with significantly faster performance and more storage.

This means, to me, that while the Pi may be great to use as a PC, it is best used by hobbyists, developers, and the like. Don’t get me wrong, you can use this for a niche PC, like a file server or HTPC, but as an all-in-one PC it doesn’t work. But, he never intended to.

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