Too expensive for 16gb ram and sadly I don’t think it’s fully the pi’s fault. It just uses one of the most in demand chips right now
Ouch. I was hesitant at $160. This is just a no. I’ll buy one if prices ever become sane again.
Jeez, you can get a 10-yo desktop computer for less than that at Re-PC.
Man I’d love a re PC here. That’d be heaven for me. My house basically is a re PC already tho lol. I love useless computers.
Thank god I’m too ignorant and stupid to have learned how to build pcs - sad/s
Everyone here talking about raspberry pi and I still to this day have no idea what I can do with one.
It’s just a computer. You can do whatever you need a computer for. Browse Lemmy on it. Play video games on it. Use it as a server. Make it run an ad video on the TV in your store window.
Whatever you need a PC for. If you don’t need a PC for something, you don’t need a Raspberry Pi.
The entire point of the Raspberry Pi was that it was a very very cheap PC, and it’s no longer cheap, so nowadays there is definitely less reason to buy one.
That is just one of the possible uses and not the most important one. Pi’s have two things that regular PCs don’t have. They have a direct integration of an GPIO port where you can easily connect individual wires as needed and they have a huge community and a lot of tutorials and also software support for all kinds of tinker jobs that can make use of that GPIO port.
These two reasons have not gone away and for many of those, you don’t need the most expensive PI with 16GB of RAM. A Pi Zero for 14 EUR or a Pi Zero 2 for 22 EUR are perfectly fine for that. The platform has plenty of life left but those high end Pi are increasingly crazily priced, mainly because of insane RAM prices.
Pi zeros are still cool. Dont tell anyone.
Oops, sorry ;)
It’s also a very small and low powered computer. That’s valuable in some cases.
And most of them have a GPIO (general-purpose input/output) header for whatever shenanigans people might be up to.
I have one setup as an ad blocker (pihole)
I was going to make a bookshelf with one to control the lights.
I use them to run Kodi for streaming media to my TV from my file server. I also would like to run retropie but I can’t figure out how to get the scaling to work on my TV.
I have mine running several virtual tabletops and caddy reverse proxy
The Pi’s were unattainable I got a Libre Computer ( https://libre.computer/ ), still working great years later. There’s lots of other alternatives out there too.
It’s strange that I’ve never heard of libre.computer. Is it new?
About eight years old.
This is for 16GB. 1G is $45, 2G is $77.
My 1G pi three is still working fine.
Okay that’s good to know. Honestly I always considered a Pi a single use, light weight device that just happens to run common ARM64. When they went for 8/16GB of RAM it felt like they were trying to turn them into mini general purpose computers.
And they do work like great general purpose computers. They have no moving parts, no fan and linux. So they are robust as fuck. Get the one that is coming in its own keyboard and you have everything you need.
I have two running several containers each, and another running a full Linux distro with desktop and browser for a family chrome board.
If they have a little RAM they do great.
Why not get something like a Beelink mini PC at this price? At least that gets you a Ryzen 5 cpu.
I wouldn’t pay the current top-end price for a Pi. A mini is a better value now, for sure.
Just sharing that the “general purpose” use isn’t a stretch or unreasonable.
How does the power use compare? Just curious, since my pi is almost always on.
It probably depends what you have running on it. Mine is basically just a Plex server. I never checked power usage.
I have an 8 node pi cluster that hosts a bunch of different things. They are pretty great.
In other words, 1G of RAM accounts for 32$?
Title is kinda misleading then. The comments prove it.
No RPI is supposed to cost me a gill or a fin though.
I bought a 16G for a project shortly after they came out on sale at Microcenter. It’s sitting in a closet right now, and it makes me feel bad that it’s not in use. I have Pi3Bs deployed everywhere, but no need for this monstrosity. Today.
Holy shit I spent like $75 on one of these with a case…
That’s kind of expensive, I bought mine for around 25-35€… (Only one with a case).
Now, my thinkcentre usff, they sometimes cost 40 to 80€…
300+? Madness.
I thought the Pi 5 was too expensive when it came out. This is just ridiculous. For most uses, a used PC, phone or tablet would be a much better choice. The only Pi I would even consider using is the Zero 2W, but they’ve been out of stock all year.
Its not actually that crazy given this is for the 16gb model. Ram is fucked at the moment 🤷♂️
Well needing 16GB might be the crazy part then.
The real power of the Pi 5 is as is a testbed that can easily convert to the CM5.
For people using them as small computers they make no real sense though
I just bought a refurbished HP EliteDesk for ~$400, and it’s much better than a pi in basically every metric except power draw. If those things are actually retailing at $385, it’s legitimately time to start treating the used/refurbished market as the new standard.
Pi also wins in size, if space really is limited. But yes you’re right, in many use cases an old normal computer makes more sense. Bit fewer e-trash also…
I’m currently building a passively cooled laptop Ryzen server with 32gb DDR4 RAM for less money. It is, like, TEN TIMES more powerful, and draws maybe 3x of Pi power consumption in peak loads, and is just as quiet and out of the way. Oh, and 1tb SSD is included in price calculations.
Times make us get creative with the tools we have.
I have a stack of these and Lenovo tinys in a drawer ranging from 8 to 2 years old. Just no time or ideas what to do with them all
Are you me 😅 thinkcentre usff FTW!
I even use one as my daily driver …
How big of a difference is the power draw?
Buddy. I am running a seven camera Frigate system with a Thinkpad X230t (2012). That is the ultimate thicc-pad with a chunky rotatable,foldable touchscreen, from 2012. Obsolete, but not on eBay, Google tpu USB dongle. Total system cost to me <$300 bucks. Oh, yeah I forgot to mention it runs my Home Assistant, Lyryion music server and Tailscale. I have a sneaky suspicion that thing is going to last for a couple more decades. It is Military grade hardware. Look it up. And if you walk into my kitchen. There’s a HA dashboard and control pane on it. It’s a touchscreen after all. You can even click the stylus/pen out of the side if your hands are greasy. There’s a recipes navigator/editor (Zim wiki) on the desktop. I don’t know. I personally think it is as stylish of a kitchen appliance as you can find. I guess it depends on your sensibilities.
Agreed, at this point, they’re capitalising as much as they can off of their reputation.
it’s legitimately time to start treating the used/refurbished market as the new standard.
true
Probably due to the shit AI. Seriously, AI is ruining society.
YA THINK??
Sorry… sorry. We’re all a little edgy over this.
AI sure does accelerate the shitty downward spiral of the last 20 years of new tech simply being more bloated crap.
I hope it (society/tech) will correct itself in response and return to sane levels of memory and cpu usage.
AI is like the last third of the human centipede. No taste and always hungry for more shit to make more shit of.
Because most AI don’t really care about ethics
May as well just buy a used laptop or desktop.
Used Mini PCs, brand name, like Lenovo tinys, are now my go to. Slightly larger, but orders of magnitude more capable, and often power sippy.
They still make use of desktop CPUs that can pull 120W and up to 250W under heavy loads. So light on power? Maybe. But power sippy? Not against an M4 Mac, which can be as little as ⅙ as much under a similarly heavy load.
Take a zero off there, bud.
Take a zero off there, bud.
Base power draw of a current i7 14700K under load is typically around 120/125W.
Full power draw in maximum turbo mode (PL2) is 250W.
Ignorance doesn’t survive long in the face of manufacturer specifications.
Or a mini pc. 16GB RAM, 500GB NVME ~$300.
Good luck when that market gets squeezed too.
Good thing there is so much old crap out there
Power consumption.
There are N100 and related SBCs that get close or match them, and if you REALLY need low power - running off a small battery or solar or something like that - you probably dont want anything with 16gb of ram.
Honestly this is a sad point. The SBC trend was going ti remarkly small idle power comsumption.
A Lenovo tiny use something like 4 w idle to 40w peak.
Electricity is green.
For a while there, second hand mini desktops like the Lenovo/Optiplex’s could be picked up for about half the price of a new Pi5. Typically had equal RAM, loads of SSD storage and desktop class(ish) CPU perfomance, plus all the other benefits (Secureboot, x86 compatibility so you could run Windows if you wished). Only major thing missing was the GPIO connection.
But looking now the prices are increasing rapidly as they have been discovered. The cheap ones are typically striped of RAM and storage.
I don’t get how they can justify this. I can get a proper mini PC with 16GB RAM and an 500GB NVME SSD for less than that.
The parts SBCs use have been hit the hardest in terms of price increases. And mini PCs aren’t a good replacement for the Pi in embedded applications.
use have been hit the hardest in terms of price increases. And mini PCs aren’t a good replacement for the Pi in embedded
I mean, yeah I’m aware that LPDDR SDRAM chips are in short supply as a lot of the capacity was shifted for other types of SDRAM, but is it enough to allow for an entire SSD to be included at the same price? Its not like flash prices haven’t also increased a ton.
I was also thinking that there are cooling systems (fans are expensive!), cases, etc. that add costs to mini PCs that mean they really shouldn’t compete with SBC in price.
Just wait for a few months for an existing stock of prebuilt PCs to run out, and you’ll see their price jump even higher.
Cheap Chinese Pi knockoffs like OrangePi are also becoming more expensive, it’s because the cost of the components increases. AI companies now buying all RAM and every RAM, even ancient DDR3.
I doubt AI companies are buying DDR3, it’s just second-order effects of new hardware being unobtainium.
I don’t know but this guy seems to understand it
Might as well just pickup a mini pc.
A mini PC and an Arduino is the ticket.
I’ve also had good luck with Orange PIs. Just checked pricing and they’ve gone up but not pushing anywhere near $400. I know Banana PIs and a few others are out there but I am less familiar with those.
Definitely going to check out Orange (and Banana) Pis. Thanks!
Depending on the use case, this is solid advice. I’d suggest checking on eBay for older, used machines that that are still pretty powerful compared to a Pi and are also quite cheap.
I wanted a mini with low power usage and fanless.
Can I run a mini-pc via PoE?
PoE can go up to 70W according to wikipedia. A few years ago, a cheap NUC would draw ~50W with heavy loads. And they would have probably been more capable than a Pi5, GPIO excluded (and you can add this to anything with USB. You might even be able to do something with a low-speed M2 port.)
Ok, so what PoE splitter do I use?
You want me to do your shopping list?
You made the post without bringing receipts.
It’s like asking “how do I bake a chocolate cake” and you said “go get ingredients from the store”. Not helpful.
You said “can I” not “how do I” and the answer was “probably yes” instead of “here’s how” so if you wanted instructions you should have framed your question as such
Ok.
How can I run a mini pc using PoE?
The question was “Can I run a mini-PC via PoE?”. The answer was Yes.
I naively assumed you knew how things worked and were unsure about the power capacity. If you wanted a detailed walkthrough on how to plug things together, you should’ve asked. And I would not have bothered.
I know how things works, sure. Do you? Because I’m asking for proof on how to do it and you’re not providing any answers.
PoE splitters exist
What PC can I run with a PoE splitter?
Oranges pi
That’s still a single board pc
As others have said max 70w with splitters. After that point just ditch ethernet. It’s very old standard. 💡A Ethernet and USB PD combination protocol. Carries two protocol on the same cable with Ethernet long distance and USB pd 240w support. But who’s going to do that?
Sure, just need a PoE adapter for it.
Which one specifically?
Depends on the input your PC needs. If it’s a common 19V power supply then you need a 19V PoE splitter like this + an adapter for whatever connector yours has: https://www.ebay.com/itm/194028107173
You’ll also need a switch that can supply 802.3bt PoE.
The usefulness of running a mini PC off of PoE seems pretty small, but there are some cases where it might make sense.
Mini pc costs a grand+
Nah, just a used one off eBay. Just now, I saw some i7 8700s w/32GB for <100$.
It will use more power, but it’s going to be a lot faster for most tasks.
Wanted to suggest solar but added cost won’t make sense without multi use
I picked up a mini PC in July for 500 that I think goes for 600 today, 16GB ddr4 ram 1TB drive, 25 watt, integrated video card with 3GB, very quiet. It runs way more retro games than my pi3, also using it for a media PC and some light DAW & development work with no problems.
I bought this one to run my Home Assistant. $329 Canadian.
That has 8GB RAM. The only reason the Pi in the headline is so expensive is the 16GB RAM. As others mentioned, the 1GB or 2GB options are a fraction of the cost.
It also comes with windows. I would pick it over a pi every single time.
Why do you need Windows?
Because I just want things to work.
The 8GB Pi5 is still around $250 though and will be much less capable than that mini PC.
It is now, just a shitty computer. It used to be a learning platform, but that price tag is not a learning price.
Learning starts long before the maxed out 16gb model
It became somewhat inevitable once companies started buying mass amounts of Pis for every purpose because they were so cost-efficient.
It used to be an education nonprofit, but it effectively became an industrial SBC supplier.
By now we’ve learned not to buy RPi again
