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I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

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Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#91

What is the point for a consumer to use a Raspberry PI 4 today? I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in. You can't find a Pi 4, much less one with equivalent specs for anywhere near this price. If you can find it, an 8GB PI4 is $75 and then you need to buy the case, power suppl…

You don't need to buy a case.

Also, the plan was $100 for the pi4+keyboard+everything combo before all this (lets just call it the 2020 era) happened. But $100 is still a much better deal than $180.

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#92

I tried using it daily as you do, but youtube had stability issues in Chromium and Firefox for ages, so now I rarely use it. When it works, great, when not, I'm not spending any more time trying to figure out why. https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=323782 https://forums.raspberrypi.com/viewtopic.php?t=323640&start=...

Ubuntu Mate 20.04 is my secret sauce, I guess. I also found Raspbian (or RPi OS as it is now called) to not always perform properly with Youtube.

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#94
post #50

If it works for you than that’s all what matters. If you want a quiet computer without the HW configuration constrains of single board with no slots, I recommend older HP EliteDesk G2 (or newer) 35W SFF. You can get them for about the same price as RPi 4/8GB and they have the option of M.2 SSD and ram expansion. The fan is down to minimal RPM (imo not even audible) and it stays cool. I have been using these for my ho…

Confirmed I bought 2 HP EliteDesk G2 within the last two years and they really are great for a non-gaming workstation or server. Both under $135. One was an I5-4590 and the other an I7-4770T (both 4th gen and generally capable CPUs), both with 16G ram and an SSD. One had no OS, however the onboard license allowed me to install Win 10 Pro without any issue. Obviously these are also great for throwing Linux onto.

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#95
post #45
post #37

If someone would build a Linux-friendly competetor to the ARM64 Mac Mini, I would consider that for my home computer. As it is, I either have to stick with x86_64, go to Apple, or have an under-powered RPi.

Why ARM specifically? Many Linux packages are not ported to ARM. Furthermore, non-Apple ARM CPUs are much slower. There are lots of fanless x86_64 options that are also energy efficient if you are willing to buy from small manufacturers or stick a fanless case yourself. The M1 performs so well partly because it uses a very advanced fabrication process. A modern Ryzen is going to have comparable single-core performanc…

I have never heard of fanless x86_64 boards. Can you share some examples please?

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#96

Linux is just “almost” there. I could probably use it for my daily programming environment - Elixir, PostgreSQL, Vim, Firefox. But then my job takes a turn… creative. Document manipulation, convert multiple Images into a PDF, easy screenshots and then make a thumbnail with that. Sign docs with my signature. Access to apps like Pixemator. Share files easily. Dropbox. It’s just easier and more productive. It’s hard to…

Flameshot is dope for screenshots. Gimp can be tough for beginners. I always fumble around before watching a tutorial. Can be annoying having to watch a tutorial just to change the color of a layer.

I like flameshot too, but I despise having to hunt for the clipboard or floppy disk icon every time I take a screenshot.

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#97

I use a Raspberry Pi 4/8G as my maine (ha ha) development machine. I have a special case, which is that I mostly ssh into my websites hosted by digital ocean. I usually have several terminal sessions (+3), some local terminal sessions and firefox. I use the pi mainly because I can have two monitors at once. I just installed ubuntu 22.10 desktop and it appears to work well. I use ubuntu mainely because it is what I ru…

This is interesting. I wonder if one could use PINN or NOOBS on a portable USB SSD drive as well in order to multiboot the needful on one bigly ssd..(?)

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#98
post #91

What is the point for a consumer to use a Raspberry PI 4 today? I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in. You can't find a Pi 4, much less one with equivalent specs for anywhere near this price. If you can find it, an 8GB PI4 is $75 and then you need to buy the case, power suppl…

You don't need to buy a case. Also, the plan was $100 for the pi4+keyboard+everything combo before all this (lets just call it the 2020 era) happened. But $100 is still a much better deal than $180.

For something you use as a main computer, it's hard to see how the time lost on something 3X slower can ever justify the ~$100 saved. At least for anyone who spends a decent amount of time on a computer and is in the developed world with a job.

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#99

What is the point for a consumer to use a Raspberry PI 4 today? I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in. You can't find a Pi 4, much less one with equivalent specs for anywhere near this price. If you can find it, an 8GB PI4 is $75 and then you need to buy the case, power suppl…

> I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in

That's an unusually low price, assuming it's new. Can you give a reference of the shop where you purchased it?

For example, the first price I've found of a Gigabyte Brix (a relatively common mini PC) with an N2807 + 8 GB RAM + 512 GB SSD + no wifi, is 210+ USD.

One of the cheapest x86 systems that I'm aware of, is the Odroid H3 (+), which still costs 129$ without RAM/disk/Wifi.

This is definitely a machine I'd suggest as ARM SBC competitor, but I'm not sure that the price is representative of mini x86 systems (when I was looking for one, a few years ago, it was the cheapest by a significant amount).

Re: I use a Raspberry Pi as my daily computer

#100

What is the point for a consumer to use a Raspberry PI 4 today? I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in. You can't find a Pi 4, much less one with equivalent specs for anywhere near this price. If you can find it, an 8GB PI4 is $75 and then you need to buy the case, power suppl…

> I recently purchased a mini PC with an Intel N5105, 16GB of Ram, 512GB NVME SSD, two gigabit ethernet ports, two HDMI ports, many USB ports, and Wifi 6. This system was $180, all in That's an unusually low price, assuming it's new. Can you give a reference of the shop where you purchased it? For example, the first price I've found of a Gigabyte Brix (a relatively common mini PC) with an N2807 + 8 GB RAM + 512 GB SS…

He probably got something like a MeLE Quieter3 on sale or used. They're usually closer to $300 with specs like that.
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