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Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

raspberrypi.org

231–240 of 776 posts

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or you know there's this thing called eMMC that's mostly pin compatible with SD cards and yet provide fast, resilient and cheap storage.

I had devices with eMMC and can't remember any of them being "fast" and "reliable".

Fast and reliable can be relative, but most SBC systems with emmc get 2-3x the IO performance of an SD card.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#232
post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by "not the situation"? That they can't afford old computers? That it's not practical? That they don't need and can buy newer ones?

I think they are implying that situations where 50+ small dell quad-core i5s are being discarded is not common in India.

That's why I'm talking about 10yr old computers (or maybe even older)

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#233
post #218
post #196

I like the subtle shout out to left handers, with the mouse on the left :)

As much as I like to see minorities supported this way (I am left-handed too), I suspect this was mainly done so they wouldn't have to cross the mouse cable over the other cables, which would have looked awkward in the photo...

Ah, so maybe V2 will have the USB port located on the right.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#234

Absolutely wonderful! This is getting ever more close to the joy of the original home computers, and a great setup for a kid to start with especially with the book provided. The RPi4 is also an impressive bit of kit. Bravo RPi foundation!

I've ordered one, it arrives tomorrow, and until I read your comment I had overlooked the book.

When I was younger, I was lucky enough to have an Amiga Commodore 500+, and I read all the included literature cover to cover, over and over again. I have a lot to thank those manuals for!

EDIT: It's available for free online as a PDF, https://magpi.raspberrypi.org/books/beginners-guide-4th-ed

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#235
This is beautiful, and it really has the vibe of the 80s home computers on which I learned how to program. What those computers also had, though, was that they immediately booted to a programming interface and a small but well defined set of capabilities explorable through coding. Wanted to do calculations? Code. Wanted to do graphics? Simple enough, but also required coding. Sound, same. You wanted to load a program or a game? You had to use the command line for that too!

Does a similar system exist today? Something you can boot a computer to and it immediately provides a kids friendly, interpreted programming environment with the ability to do graphics and sounds- but nothing else? That would be the perfect companion to this machine.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#236
post #220
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Benchmark: 430000x Cool. That would mean performence more then doubled on a yearly basis. Unfortunately, your "reference" is just the same numbers you posted but as an image. I don't know if this counts as a "reference" :) Any links to who performed those benchmarks?

That would mean performence more then doubled on a yearly basis. How do you figure? They were released 30+ years apart. 2^30 would be a billion times faster. Instead it's something under 19 doublings, nowhere close to doubling every year for 37 years.

Isn’t Moore’s law a doubling (of density) every two years?

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#237
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like you're not the target audience for a RPi. They are meant to be cheap computers for "the promotion of teaching basic computer science in schools and in developing countries"[0]. Adding NVMe support would increase the price. There are alternatives to RPi that do what you want, odroid-h2plus for example. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi

If would make sense to be able to attach a $25 32GB SSD to the bottom of a RPI. Then add some kind of a U-shaped connector to connect the RPI to the SSD and a place for the screws, so that they are fixed back to back.

I was going to say the same thing. The RPi was introduced at a time when cheap SATA SSDs weren't a thing, nor were beefy ARM CPUs. It's starting to feel like an Edward Scissorhands situation.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#238
post #64
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like you're not the target audience for a RPi. They are meant to be cheap computers for "the promotion of teaching basic computer science in schools and in developing countries"[0]. Adding NVMe support would increase the price. There are alternatives to RPi that do what you want, odroid-h2plus for example. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi

Schools don't want to be debugging microSD and USB issues.

you're right, they want to not debug anything at all, they want to have a drawer full of microSD cards with the OS pre-installed. When a kid says "I have a problem" you say "ok here's a fresh install" and swap the SD card.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#239
post #204

Any recommendation for a monitor? My 5yo son has fun with an external keyboard connected to an old Android tablet. He learns to type and write basic math and words. I'd like him to jump to the next step. I was contemplating buying him a monitor and a mouse to plug in an old Raspberry with linux distro for kids.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005BZNDOO

I've been buying Asus monitors for years, and I just bought that one specifically for hooking up tertiary computers like Pi's.

Re: Raspberry Pi 400 Desktop PC

#240

As an engineer/founder from India who dreams of access to the Internet for everyone on this planet, these are the efforts that make me smile. I am in the process of sorting out my financial situation - tough founder luck. But I am happy to order a few of these (and monitors) and rent a small garage to give local kids a free computer lab to learn. (Kolkata, India)

E-waste is a massive problem nowadays. Why not assemble the lab out of "old" computers? They might take a bit more electricity to run, but, at least in the US, you can get truckloads of computers that were destined for the scrapyard, for free. One local school here threw away 50+ small dell quad-core i5's in their quest to make sure they spend their money wisely. I've assembled a small lab, with many computers, laser…

Electricity utilization is another dimension. A Pi can run off batteries or a hand crank in the worst case.
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