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Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

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Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#1

Post by ecmascript »

I have several raspberry pis at home but I have never used them for anything else than small servers of different kinds like pi-hole, webservers etc. For quite some time I have wondered if it was all possible to use it 100% of the time coding on it etc.

Therefore I am wondering if anyone here uses a raspberry pi as their main computer, maybe for coding on, paying bills, surfing the web etc.

How is the experience, what version do you use with how much ram etc? What are the issues, if any?

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#3

Post by blisterpeanuts »

I have a couple of Pi's on the network. I tried to replace an older, home-built Linux file server with a Pi 4: stock Raspbian, a 5 TB USB drive, no display. It was very slow; finally I replaced it with a $250 refurbished Dell from Ebay; threw Debian on it, and never looked back. Pi is a fun toy for some purposes but at this point I don't see it being useful as anything but a wireguard gateway (eventually).

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#5

Post by ecmascript »

warrenm wrote: post #4
amirouche wrote: post #2

surfing the web is a pain. I use a phone for webmail stuff, otherwise fallback to tui. rpi400 with alpine 64bit, external 1To SSD usb 3.

why is it a "pain"?

I am a bit curious on why the OP think it's a pain. What version of raspberry pi is he/she using?

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#6

Post by mattl »

ecmascript wrote: post #5
warrenm wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why is it a "pain"?

I am a bit curious on why the OP think it's a pain. What version of raspberry pi is he/she using?

I’d imagine JavaScript heavy sites are pretty miserable on the Pi even the latest models.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#8

Post by mysterydip »

mattl wrote: post #6
ecmascript wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a bit curious on why the OP think it's a pain. What version of raspberry pi is he/she using?

I’d imagine JavaScript heavy sites are pretty miserable on the Pi even the latest models.

Which is remarkable given how many older systems and software the pi can run natively or emulate at full speed. The web really can be embarassing in terms of performance.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#9

Post by ecmascript »

mattl wrote: post #6
ecmascript wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a bit curious on why the OP think it's a pain. What version of raspberry pi is he/she using?

I’d imagine JavaScript heavy sites are pretty miserable on the Pi even the latest models.

As a javascript dev myself which write javascript heavy websites, I think all of my sites would perform just fine on a raspberry pi, at least on the newer models.

What I am most afraid of is the editing experience mostly.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone use a Raspberry Pi as your main computer?

#10

Post by brudgers »

The idea attracted me once.

The reality is that a used laptop is more affordable by the time a screen, keyboard, pointing device, power supply and clock are added and provides orders of magnitude better experience.

Or to put it another way, using an RPi as a daily driver was not a hill I found worth dying on. Linux is Linux. Good luck.

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