5 ms·

A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. People pay more because they want more. If y

A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. People pay more because they want more. If your goal is just learning how computers work, you have far cheaper options today.

coldtea 8y ago
>A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. That would be relevant if the metric was "cpu power of computer sold in the 80s". There were some $100 (or even $25) pieces of hardware far more powerful than ENIAC in 1980 as well. But the relevant metric is "cpu power appropriate for contemporary uses and programs" -- and in 2018 it means what people in 2018 consider a home computer. >If your goal is just learning how computers work, you have far cheaper options today. Why would that be your goal? That's only of interest to programmers and tinkerers, not 95% of the population.
- faccacta 8y ago
  In 1983 “learning how computers work” was a huge goal for many buyers. Parents bought computers so that kids could learn to use them, which often meant learning to program. (BTW, thank you, mom and dad).
- djmips 8y ago
  Eniac equivalent computers available for $25 in 1980. Do tell me more.
  - B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago
    Well, I think 8086s were going for more than that, but Z80s or 6502s would probably fit the bill on MIPS if not IO.
  - Retric 8y ago
    Eniac was only 500 flops and after an upgrade only had 100 words of ram. So a 6502 released in 1975 was a ~1,000x faster 8 bit cpu for 25$, granted very different architecture but easily much faster even if you where emulating an eniac. For reference a ‘speak and spell’ sold for 50$ back then and had IO but was not programmable.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    Given that ENIAC didn't have a monitor (or keyboard for that matter) you just needed a very slow CPU and some means of input and some lights for output (a little soldering could solve that). The 6502 (available even earlier than 1980) cost $25 -- and was used (e.g. in C64 well into the mid-80s and even today). ENIAC 0.00289 MIPS Commodore 64 0.02 MIPS
    - dannypgh 8y ago
      And the motherboard? RAM? The pi is a whole computer built around a SoC. The 6502 is a CPU only. This $25 claim seems questionable.
TeMPOraL 8y ago
> A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. But what Moore's law giveth, web developers taketh away. If you want to use a computer to participate in the modern society, you need much more than a Raspberry Pi, due to web bloat.
- riffic 8y ago
  Define what exactly it means to participate in the modern society.
  - tedunangst 8y ago
    Load a page of tweets.
    - dijit 8y ago
      I think that’s kind of flippant. The reality is that it’s very difficult to apply for jobs or even do banking effectively without internet access and a capable browser. I think this is what the parent means by “engage with society”. Although, I think a rPI is capable, even if it would be frustratingly slow.
      - yellowapple 8y ago
        Flippant or not, it's a good demonstration of how a prerequisite of participating in a Twitter-and-Facebook-driven modern society is using a computer that's powerful enough to handle all the garbage those two companies insist upon running on said computer whenever you so much as think of participating in said society. The World Wide Web would be a much better place if web developers/designers showed even the slightest bit of restraint when it comes to shoving arbitrary Turing-complete code down my throat. Statistically-speaking, 95+% of it doesn't benefit me in the slightest, and there's a special place in hell for those who write websites such that I have to put up with that 95% that's garbage just to use the site at all. Loading 10 or 20 or even 1000 140-character tweets should be possible even on an old DOS PC with dialup, and yet even 10-year-old PCs with multiple orders of magnitude more processing power and network speed/bandwidth struggle with that.
lazylizard 8y ago
heh. flippant comment but. flip that around. " If your goal is just to work on computers, you have far cheaper options today. " 1 of my 2 desktops at work is a 2006 mac mini g-7450. it can email. and view pdfs and edit office documents. it has ten-four fox. and it can ssh. yeah. mostly email and ssh...

coldtea 8y ago

>A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. That would be relevant if the metric was "cpu power of computer sold in the 80s". There were some $100 (or even $25) pieces of hardware far more powerful than ENIAC in 1980 as well. But the relevant metric is "cpu power appropriate for contemporary uses and programs" -- and in 2018 it means what people in 2018 consider a home computer. >If your goal is just learning how computers work, you have far cheaper options today. Why would that be your goal? That's only of interest to programmers and tinkerers, not 95% of the population.

faccacta 8y ago
In 1983 “learning how computers work” was a huge goal for many buyers. Parents bought computers so that kids could learn to use them, which often meant learning to program. (BTW, thank you, mom and dad).
djmips 8y ago
Eniac equivalent computers available for $25 in 1980. Do tell me more.
- B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago
  Well, I think 8086s were going for more than that, but Z80s or 6502s would probably fit the bill on MIPS if not IO.
- Retric 8y ago
  Eniac was only 500 flops and after an upgrade only had 100 words of ram. So a 6502 released in 1975 was a ~1,000x faster 8 bit cpu for 25$, granted very different architecture but easily much faster even if you where emulating an eniac. For reference a ‘speak and spell’ sold for 50$ back then and had IO but was not programmable.
- coldtea 8y ago
  Given that ENIAC didn't have a monitor (or keyboard for that matter) you just needed a very slow CPU and some means of input and some lights for output (a little soldering could solve that). The 6502 (available even earlier than 1980) cost $25 -- and was used (e.g. in C64 well into the mid-80s and even today). ENIAC 0.00289 MIPS Commodore 64 0.02 MIPS
  - dannypgh 8y ago
    And the motherboard? RAM? The pi is a whole computer built around a SoC. The 6502 is a CPU only. This $25 claim seems questionable.

TeMPOraL 8y ago

> A raspberry pi is $25 and far exceeds the home computer of the 80s and most of the home computers sold in the 90s. But what Moore's law giveth, web developers taketh away. If you want to use a computer to participate in the modern society, you need much more than a Raspberry Pi, due to web bloat.

riffic 8y ago
Define what exactly it means to participate in the modern society.
- tedunangst 8y ago
  Load a page of tweets.
  - dijit 8y ago
    I think that’s kind of flippant. The reality is that it’s very difficult to apply for jobs or even do banking effectively without internet access and a capable browser. I think this is what the parent means by “engage with society”. Although, I think a rPI is capable, even if it would be frustratingly slow.
    - yellowapple 8y ago
      Flippant or not, it's a good demonstration of how a prerequisite of participating in a Twitter-and-Facebook-driven modern society is using a computer that's powerful enough to handle all the garbage those two companies insist upon running on said computer whenever you so much as think of participating in said society. The World Wide Web would be a much better place if web developers/designers showed even the slightest bit of restraint when it comes to shoving arbitrary Turing-complete code down my throat. Statistically-speaking, 95+% of it doesn't benefit me in the slightest, and there's a special place in hell for those who write websites such that I have to put up with that 95% that's garbage just to use the site at all. Loading 10 or 20 or even 1000 140-character tweets should be possible even on an old DOS PC with dialup, and yet even 10-year-old PCs with multiple orders of magnitude more processing power and network speed/bandwidth struggle with that.

lazylizard 8y ago

heh. flippant comment but. flip that around. " If your goal is just to work on computers, you have far cheaper options today. " 1 of my 2 desktops at work is a 2006 mac mini g-7450. it can email. and view pdfs and edit office documents. it has ten-four fox. and it can ssh. yeah. mostly email and ssh...