First Photos and Video of Raspberry Pi Model A 125
coop0030 writes "The first photos and videos of the Model A production samples are now available. The Raspberry Pi Model A is the newest low-cost computer from the Raspberry Pi Foundation. Compared to the popular Model B, the Model A forgoes the Ethernet Controller, has 256MB of RAM, and has a single USB port. A benefit of the missing Ethernet controller is that power consumption is reduced. This allowed them to reach their goals of a low-cost $25 computer. The release date is for sometime early in 2013."
ARMv6 (Score:1, Insightful)
It's 2012, 2013 in about 400 hours. ARMv6 and just one USB2.0 port, which isn't even working right. You have got to be kidding.
STFU already /.; everybody knows and nobody cares! (Score:1, Insightful)
STFU already about Raspberry Pi, at least until the A model is actually available; everybody knows and nobody cares!
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:256 is not enough (Score:4, Insightful)
Low-cost computer, not general-purpose desktop-replacement.
Re:Ummmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Interesting. I saw a post just like yours when the Raspberry Pi was first announced. End result was demand was so high it was quite difficult to get. We'll see how it pans out this time.
goal was always for a $25 computer (Score:4, Insightful)
...except it wasn't.
The goal was to stop the erosion in what is perceived to be "computer skills" and interest in computer science as computing in UK schools had become about "Office" and Consumer computing had become "electronics". In fact the cheap part is in response to computers being expensive and arcane. [from http://www.raspberrypi.org/about%5D [raspberrypi.org]
I personally am convinced that the costs involved in raising the costs slightly to increase "memory" not anything else is incredibly wise. I have used GNU/Linux on little memory and its not fun...and Android seems to have similar requirements.
Re:Availability. (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have a PDP-11 why do you want a raspberry-pi?
Re:256 is not enough (Score:2, Insightful)
It's got HDMI, so it's expected to run a GUI with applications, especially after the RaPi-Foundation showed off Linux desktops in their promotional videos. Even the stated purposes of teaching programmers requires that you can look up documentation, which means there has got to be a working web browser. There are also cheaper systems with much lower power consumption if you don't need a display, and much more powerful systems if you want a low cost Linux desktop.
They've also said that you wouldn't expect to use the model A for the same purposes you use model B. Seriously; what better way to debug something than to plug it to a display? And how does HDMI force you to use a GUI? When has learning programming required a web browser?
Re:Ummmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ARMv6 (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair, you can get Arduino clones for a lot less than that...
You can even make one yourself. Solder a $3 chip to a piece of perfboard and write "Arduino" on it. It'll work just the same.
The official $30 Arduino is for people who want their voltage regulators, USB interface, etc. all on a single board. Apparently that's a lot of people...
Re:Ummmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they:
1. Don't care much about that difference
and
2. Buy lots of them in which case it's a saving of not 10$ but 30% - and that's a lot.
Re:I don't know about anyone else (Score:5, Insightful)
I bought one and I'm sick and fucking tired of hearing about it. I don't want to hear one more fucking thing until ICS or later is running on it, personally, since that was the news that got me to buy one, and then they never released it, and Liz never adequately explained why.
Raspberry Pi serves as a reminder to the community as to why we still need electronics companies. Apparently, we are not yet capable of producing and delivering a product this complex without doing it badly, even with all the support you could ever hope for from the vendor.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
And to teachers who have to find money for thirty of them.
$15 Pi (Score:4, Insightful)
More interesting is a $15 Pi with lower HW specs [wikipedia.org] : no audio; no serial (only 1 USB, like Model A); no HDMI (only VGA) or even no video. But also integrated wireless mesh, preferably a snapin daughtercard for either Bluetooth, Zigbee, or even WiFi.
The purpose of these devices is to bootstrap British youth Computer Science education. That education better focus on networked distributed computing, preferably wireless for mobile or just ubiquity. Only one of the machines on the network needs better specs, for human interface. The rest should interface to the many things we have to make smart.
I personally would buy thousands of those low spec devices each year. I'm sure there's a market for hundreds of millions, probably many billion of them. Though most of that market will probably be served by stickon, postage-stamp sized devices powered by ambient (heat, light, flexing) energy and cost under $1, we have to get there steadily. I don't know why Chinese exporters aren't selling Model A and Model B for under $20 already (they're $80+), and a $10- Model C stripped down from there.