5 ms·

I think it's like Arduino. If you're not well versed into the world of embedded boards it can be tricky to navigate all the offerings. RPi is popular, massively

by simias 6y ago

I think it's like Arduino. If you're not well versed into the world of embedded boards it can be tricky to navigate all the offerings. RPi is popular, massively well supported, you can find tons of projects online using it for almost anything, it seems like the safe choice. I mean, I have the strong suspicion that the vast majority of RPi owners wouldn't be able to cite the name of a single alternative. Not a one. RPi's popularity eclipsed everything else (like Arduino in its heyday). And even in your comment you haven't mentioned any alternative yourself, only that they exist. If you care about people using alternatives you should start with that. Actually, I should too, but the only Embedded Linux boards with a PCIe interface I've used are super expensive FPGA-based ones, so not really in the same category.

monocasa 6y ago
Even as someone well versed in the embedded world (my previous job had me as a lead for a proprietary high availability RTOS, which I personally ported to several ISAs), I still prefer RPi to the other boards. I normally get these boards with an endgoal in mind that isn't just "play with the board". While none of these boards have anything approaching the real support you'd get as a first rate developer, at least the RPis have an ecosystem of exactly the kind of stuff in the article so you have an equivalent to support. The Pine64 peeps seem close, but I haven't dug too deep there. Everything else seems to be "oh look, you can technically run Linux, but don't touch anything that the vendor provided for you".
- elcritch 6y ago
  Exactly, I tried using Omega Onion’s but it turns out you can really only use their version of Linux. They claim support for booting from an SD card, but not really. The Chinese based Orange/Nano’s use Allwinner soc’s and the mainstream Linux support for those have gotten better, but nowhere near the pi’s. Though must say TI AM3* boards (beagle’s) have good mainline Linux support and they appear to do all their work on public got repos. Now the iMX* boards seem nice but I haven’t really found a maker board variant.
- koffiezet 6y ago
  Have you ever looked at beaglebones? TI's support is pretty nice in my experience, and the hardware is a LOT more solid and reliable. Certainly the USB stack has been a weak point on the RPi, which is problematic since the ethernet adapter is USB. For most embedded work which needs to be reliable, the RPi is to much designed to a price, with enough tradeoffs making it an unattractive and ultimately more expensive option. In a PoC we did, we had to replace RPi's weekly in the field, racking up intervention costs. This completely disappeared the moment we switched to beaglebones. I quite like the RPi for what it is, a cheap & fun platform offering a lot of possibilities to the masses, but I wouldn't consider it to be a serious embedded platform to target you can depend on. But I've used it as a video/slideshow player in real-world situations, where if they'd drop out, there aren't any real consequences (which most of the time were cards failing, and yes, the root-fs was read-only...)

by simias 6y ago

monocasa 6y ago

Even as someone well versed in the embedded world (my previous job had me as a lead for a proprietary high availability RTOS, which I personally ported to several ISAs), I still prefer RPi to the other boards. I normally get these boards with an endgoal in mind that isn't just "play with the board". While none of these boards have anything approaching the real support you'd get as a first rate developer, at least the RPis have an ecosystem of exactly the kind of stuff in the article so you have an equivalent to support. The Pine64 peeps seem close, but I haven't dug too deep there. Everything else seems to be "oh look, you can technically run Linux, but don't touch anything that the vendor provided for you".

elcritch 6y ago
Exactly, I tried using Omega Onion’s but it turns out you can really only use their version of Linux. They claim support for booting from an SD card, but not really. The Chinese based Orange/Nano’s use Allwinner soc’s and the mainstream Linux support for those have gotten better, but nowhere near the pi’s. Though must say TI AM3* boards (beagle’s) have good mainline Linux support and they appear to do all their work on public got repos. Now the iMX* boards seem nice but I haven’t really found a maker board variant.
koffiezet 6y ago
Have you ever looked at beaglebones? TI's support is pretty nice in my experience, and the hardware is a LOT more solid and reliable. Certainly the USB stack has been a weak point on the RPi, which is problematic since the ethernet adapter is USB. For most embedded work which needs to be reliable, the RPi is to much designed to a price, with enough tradeoffs making it an unattractive and ultimately more expensive option. In a PoC we did, we had to replace RPi's weekly in the field, racking up intervention costs. This completely disappeared the moment we switched to beaglebones. I quite like the RPi for what it is, a cheap & fun platform offering a lot of possibilities to the masses, but I wouldn't consider it to be a serious embedded platform to target you can depend on. But I've used it as a video/slideshow player in real-world situations, where if they'd drop out, there aren't any real consequences (which most of the time were cards failing, and yes, the root-fs was read-only...)