Just about every other board out there is just as plug and play as the RPI. I'm not saying that to downplay the RPI - the community it has around it is great,

Just about every other board out there is just as plug and play as the RPI. I'm not saying that to downplay the RPI - the community it has around it is great, but long gone are the days of trying to get Linux running on a random arm board. And I should know, I have over 100 different arm machines at my place.