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Raspberry Pi Compute Module

raspberrypi.org

91–100 of 116 posts

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You will also find a large price tag. And probably inability to actually buy one alas.

You can get the Mirabox based on the Marvell Armada 370 for about £150, one-off. Includes dual 1GbE. Eg http://www.newit.co.uk/shop/All-MiraBox/MiraBox

That's not really server class, more a consumer product.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#92
post #90
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but say I need to run a rails application with a DB on a Lan (less than 15 users), perfomance is not an issue (nginx + postgresql + puma uses less than 115 MB of RAM!) The only thing stopping you is SDCard's reliability! A friend of mine had two unrecoverably broken Kingston class 10 SDCards on the same RPi in 6 months. Bad luck maybe, but still I'd love to have something more solid to run applications without fe…

You can setup the SD card to run read only, and use a external usb hard drive when you need to write.

Correct me if I am wrong but it is my understanding that you can still have read problems on an RO SD card. In fact I was recently reading a Micron Application note that explained that the mere act of reading it could cause bit-flips.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#93
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the existing RPi's GPU has 24 GFLOP capability, which is roughly the same as the GPU on the baseline i.MX6 (the Vivante GC2000). Now, a lot of that capability has historically been unavailable to RPi users, but they're slowly responding to pressure and opening up the GPU. But I also saw the headline and was hoping for some nice little GPU compute add-on the RPi. Oh well. I still think this is a very promising f…

It's pretty nuts that a tiny little thing like this has gigaflops of compute power.

I agree -- I know it's silly but I still marvel at the fact that the $10 microcontroller I'm working on has almost the processing power of the laptop I used in college in the 90s (and in the case of the RPi, vastly more).

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#94
post #37
post #2

I'll be interested to see how this progresses. With any luck, it'll open up a market of cheap, well-distributed SOMs, similar to the Pi opening up a market for cheap, well-distributed ARM/Linux Dev Boards. The situation's surprisingly similar: Powerful ARM Dev boards existed before the Pi, but the price was steep, they couldn't be found in traditional distribution channels, and the OS/Driver support was poor at best.…

You really see these being sold in Radio Shack? With Pis, all the average person needed was a regular keyboard, mouse & monitor to plug in. That's why it worked. That's all been thrown out here.

My local Radio Shack carries both Arduinos and various Propeller microcontrollers, along with sundry components for them (LCDs, wifi, bluetooth, etc). It also sells various breadboards and some really cool individual integrated circuits (hex and other logic gates), MOSFETs, CMOSs, and bunches of other cool stuff. And I'm not in a huge city or in California.

If you're into hobby electronics, it's worth checking out Radio Shack if you've not been in one for a while. They carry much more than just electronic kits for kids.

But I agree that the target market for these is more professional engineers looking to take a prototype into smalltime production, or an early protype into something more refined.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#95

So for many distributed computations in my field (pretty much anything that isn't embarrassingly parallel [0]), the limiting factor is often network communication -- how quickly nodes can send messages to each other. Even as just a toy, putting an affordable arm chip with a serious interconnect would be a really big deal. This is a great step closer. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarrassingly_parallel

This is quite badly named and isn't intended for number-crunching. It's for when you want to use a RPi in a project, but want it smaller or better integrated into your other electronics. Think about a kiosk, or digital signage.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#97
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like doing this will let out the magic smoke in a hurry. Do you think they've fused it so it doesn't short out and trash any board you put it into by mistake?

Seems unlikely. Fuses, MOVs, and clamp diodes cause signal integrity issues (especially at 3.3V and under). And, for 200 lines, the cost might be impressive. That said, if the Pi foundation can arrange for all the I/O to come out of reset in a hi-Z state, then there's a chance they could arrange the rest of the pins to avoid damage. But would it be worth the effort? Given how hard it is to access most sodimm sockets,…

It's like how people used to mistakenly plug their modem phone cord into a PBX jack and fry their modem because the voltages were way higher.

Having it show up as an unrecognized DIMM would be clever, but perhaps not worth the trouble.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#98

I wonder what type of applications will come out of this. For example, I want to build security cameras with Raspberry Pis, but I don't need audio output, USB, HDMI, etc...but I would need WiFi, camera unit, and power. But I doubt we'd see custom IO boards for specific applications such as this, and I don't think it'd be any cheaper than just buying a regular Pi.

Well, just custom-build a PCB. Either laserprinter-etch it yourself or use one of the maker services. If you're just after USB (for the wifi) + camera + power, you don't need that many pins so you can solder the SMD SODIMM socket even by hand.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#99
It kind of bothers me that the Raspberry Pi Foundation is supposed to an educational charity, yet they are devoting resources towards developing products aimed business and industrial users. It doesn't seem aligned with their stated mission.

Re: Raspberry Pi Compute Module

#100
post #53

is this now viable for cluster? I mean simple backbone for 20+ for these with combined network and power unit? is there still any point at all?

It would make a nice cross between a dedicated server and a virtual server. You could rent out 20+ "nodes" where each node is a dedicated computer with low performance.
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