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I realised a while ago that it’s way cheaper to hunt for second-hand intel NUCs, and the resulting machine is way more powerful… And the RAM and storage is upgradeable, if the NUC didn’t come with plenty of storage or RAM already…
Basically the only benefit the Pi has is GPIO pins for embedded projects.
Pi is also a fraction of the power consumption (meaning also heat dissipation requirements) and physical size.
The Pi can actually be higher in some cases in my experience.
I have a pair of passively cooled PCs with i3-7100u CPUs, RAM, and a single NVMe drive each, and they draw around 1-2W when idle.
Low power draw but ridiculous power supply requirements of 5V5A (depending on the model) with a USB-C connector which isnt a thing outside of this specific application meaning they’re going to be expensive and hard to source. They should have just done a barrel plug or put an effing voltage regulator on board like Arduinos.
Low power draw but ridiculous power supply requirements of 5V5A (depending on the model) with a USB-C connector which isnt a thing outside of this specific application meaning they’re going to be expensive and hard to source.
That’s only for the Pi 5 (the highest end unit), and I’ll agree that at that level its hard to justify a Pi over a larger computer. Even for the Pi 5 its not that hard to find those Power Supplies. Most laptops today use power supplies that meet or exceed those specs. You’re right that those are more expensive than Pi 4 and below Power Supplies.
They should have just done a barrel plug or put an effing voltage regulator on board like Arduinos.
Again, no defense of Pi 5 from me. However, for everything below Pi 5, HARD PASS on a voltage regulator. I don’t want that heat in the tiny Pi case. At the lower power requirements of Pi4 and below USB power is fine.
Yeah a voltage regulator would be a bad idea, however a well designed DC-DC buck converter can be in the 95%+ efficiency range and produce very little heat.
Which a $3 ESP32 can handle instead.
Where do you get your ESP32s from? They’re $10 each on Amazon
https://a.aliexpress.com/_msfObvf
Bear in mind these are probably not production grade. So if you have a real use case that needs to last don’t use these. But for messing around and doing hobby projects these are fine.
Digikey has the official espressif dev boards, if you want decent quality ones.
Jesus who is spending $200+ on a raspberry pi?
You can get an entire kick ass 2/3 year old mini PC with everything included for the price of a single RPi4, let alone 5. And you don’t have to buy any kits or expansions to get full functionality.
Oh and that mini PC will have at least 2 - 3 times the specs of the RPi. It’s just not worth it anymore to buy Pis.
