5 ms·

There is no x86 equivalent at that price point & form factor.

by robert_foss 6y ago

unixhero 6y ago
Nor energy usage.
- ThrowawayR2 6y ago
  That's often said but seems to be a myth. - The Odroid H2+ x86 board claims about ~4W idle power: https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h2plus https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h2plus - This measurement of idle power on the Raspberry Pi 4 says it uses ~3.4W: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/raspberry-pi-4 https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/raspberry-pi-4
- my123 6y ago
  Intel tried to make: https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/79084/intel-quark-soc-x1000-16k-cache-400-mhz.html https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/79084/i... in the past as a relatively cheap x86 CPU. ($9.62 per unit) However, it's a 400MHz 486 with some backports (1st generation Pentium, no MMX even) and broken LOCK prefix so that software specifically needed to be recompiled for it. And at 2.2 W too, it never ended up succeeding anywhere, with no successor.
  - toast0 6y ago
    I was pretty sure (without citations) the quark is a die shrunk pre-mmx pentium (but post division table bug), are you sure it's a 486? The right era pentium had the same LOCK prefix issue (we used to call it the F00F bug) Edit: Thanks for link; I must have anchored on the instruction set and ignored that it was using the 486 pipeline.
    - my123 6y ago
      https://www.linleygroup.com/newsletters/newsletter_detail.php?num=5074 https://www.linleygroup.com/newsletters/newsletter_detail.ph... "The new x86 CPU uses an old-school 486 scalar pipeline and the original Pentium instruction set with some modern enhancements"
    - tedunangst 6y ago
      The fact it's got the f00f bug certainly made it sound like a dusted off pentium core.
  - jandrese 6y ago
    Yeah, but the PC104 boards that those got stuck on were still $250 each.
- AshamedCaptain 6y ago
  Actually, that would only be right if the Raspberry Pi was any good regarding power usage. However the Raspberry Pi is utterly crap at power savings, with practically no power saving modes and very power-hungry (though cheap) components. (excluding the RPI0 models, which have no peripherals whatsoever). I have a _very old_ PN40 from Asus -- this is a full PC with an intel Celeron, a SATA SSD and about 8GB of RAM that idles at 1.7W (serving websites via GB Ethernet) as measured _at the wall_. This is just standard PC Linux distro with zero customization (other than `powertop --auto-tune`). For comparison, the latest RPI4B without the SSD and with 1/8 RAM idles at 3.5ishW on the wall. Even the older RPI3 I could never get below 2W, and that is without any peripherals (no display, no Wifi, no eth, min USB) and significant tuning. On the other hand the PN40 + components cost significantly more (probably close to 10x), and the CPU performance itself is not that good these days.
  - gtirloni 6y ago
    That's weird. Most places report rpi's idling below 1W https://raspi.tv/2019/how-much-power-does-the-pi4b-use-power-measurements https://raspi.tv/2019/how-much-power-does-the-pi4b-use-power...
    - davrosthedalek 6y ago
      That website lists Pi4B at 575mA. At 5V, that's 2.875W. With efficiency of a typical usb power supply, ~80%, that's about 3.5W at the wall.
      - gtirloni 6y ago
        Ah, got it. I misread the data, thank you.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  Latest x86 mobile chips (with U in their names) are very low-energy consumers.
ThrowawayR2 6y ago
The Intel Compute Stick (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/boards-kits/compute-stick.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/boards-kits...) and its clones (which can still be found easily on eBay) and the Intel Compute Card (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/compute-card/compute-card-brief.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/compute-card/compute...) showed that x86 could match the Raspberry Pi form factor with roughly the same idle power and much better peak performance. However, the parent is correct that Intel couldn't (or wasn't willing to) match the price point.
- my123 6y ago
  Raspberry Pis are on much older Arm architectures/manufacturing processes, with nowhere near the performance of a smartphone, and with very reduced energy efficiency. Raspberry Pi 3 was a Cortex-A53 back ported to 40nm outright. Raspberry Pi 4 is on 28nm. (for comparison, Apple A8 and Snapdragon 810 were on 20nm already, in 2014-15) It runs with a Cortex-A72 at a low clock (1.5GHz, phones even are at twice that clock nowadays) and quite high power consumption because of the process node. The memory interface is narrow (32-bit bus, phones ship with a 64-bit bus and laptops/desktops with a 128b one) at a low data rate (LPDDR4-3200). In addition to that, the CPU can only use 5GB/sec of it, with the remainder being reserved for the GPU only. Those were some of the sacrifices needed to reach this price point. (and why it isn't representative at all of the performance of higher-end ARMs)
  - vardump 6y ago
    Yeah, Raspberry Pi needs a 64-bit memory bus pretty badly. Hopefully it's feasible in the future without compromising cost.
- JoshTriplett 6y ago
  The Raspberry Pi is also more solder-friendly, with GPIO and similar. The Compute Stick makes sense if you're going to connect to well-defined ports.
- Laforet 6y ago
  The earlier models of compute stick had serious EMF issues with their USB and 2.4Ghz radio to the point that some configurations were practically unusable. This turned a lot of people away and it never got popular. Not to mention they ran pretty hot even with active cooling. At the same time Intel was heavily subsidizing their x86 mobile SoCs to tablet manufacturers and for a while it was actually quite competitive price wise but it ultimately went bothered.
mkaic 6y ago
Atomic Pi is pretty darn close, though it's twice the size. Severely underrate SBC imo

There is no x86 equivalent at that price point & form factor.

unixhero 6y ago

Nor energy usage.

ThrowawayR2 6y ago
That's often said but seems to be a myth. - The Odroid H2+ x86 board claims about ~4W idle power: https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h2plus https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/odroid-h2plus - This measurement of idle power on the Raspberry Pi 4 says it uses ~3.4W: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/raspberry-pi-4 https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/raspberry-pi-4
my123 6y ago
Intel tried to make: https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/79084/intel-quark-soc-x1000-16k-cache-400-mhz.html https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/79084/i... in the past as a relatively cheap x86 CPU. ($9.62 per unit) However, it's a 400MHz 486 with some backports (1st generation Pentium, no MMX even) and broken LOCK prefix so that software specifically needed to be recompiled for it. And at 2.2 W too, it never ended up succeeding anywhere, with no successor.
- toast0 6y ago
  I was pretty sure (without citations) the quark is a die shrunk pre-mmx pentium (but post division table bug), are you sure it's a 486? The right era pentium had the same LOCK prefix issue (we used to call it the F00F bug) Edit: Thanks for link; I must have anchored on the instruction set and ignored that it was using the 486 pipeline.
  - my123 6y ago
    https://www.linleygroup.com/newsletters/newsletter_detail.php?num=5074 https://www.linleygroup.com/newsletters/newsletter_detail.ph... "The new x86 CPU uses an old-school 486 scalar pipeline and the original Pentium instruction set with some modern enhancements"
  - tedunangst 6y ago
    The fact it's got the f00f bug certainly made it sound like a dusted off pentium core.
- jandrese 6y ago
  Yeah, but the PC104 boards that those got stuck on were still $250 each.
AshamedCaptain 6y ago
Actually, that would only be right if the Raspberry Pi was any good regarding power usage. However the Raspberry Pi is utterly crap at power savings, with practically no power saving modes and very power-hungry (though cheap) components. (excluding the RPI0 models, which have no peripherals whatsoever). I have a _very old_ PN40 from Asus -- this is a full PC with an intel Celeron, a SATA SSD and about 8GB of RAM that idles at 1.7W (serving websites via GB Ethernet) as measured _at the wall_. This is just standard PC Linux distro with zero customization (other than `powertop --auto-tune`). For comparison, the latest RPI4B without the SSD and with 1/8 RAM idles at 3.5ishW on the wall. Even the older RPI3 I could never get below 2W, and that is without any peripherals (no display, no Wifi, no eth, min USB) and significant tuning. On the other hand the PN40 + components cost significantly more (probably close to 10x), and the CPU performance itself is not that good these days.
- gtirloni 6y ago
  That's weird. Most places report rpi's idling below 1W https://raspi.tv/2019/how-much-power-does-the-pi4b-use-power-measurements https://raspi.tv/2019/how-much-power-does-the-pi4b-use-power...
  - davrosthedalek 6y ago
    That website lists Pi4B at 575mA. At 5V, that's 2.875W. With efficiency of a typical usb power supply, ~80%, that's about 3.5W at the wall.
    - gtirloni 6y ago
      Ah, got it. I misread the data, thank you.
ekianjo 6y ago
Latest x86 mobile chips (with U in their names) are very low-energy consumers.

ThrowawayR2 6y ago

The Intel Compute Stick (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/boards-kits/compute-stick.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/boards-kits...) and its clones (which can still be found easily on eBay) and the Intel Compute Card (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/compute-card/compute-card-brief.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/compute-card/compute...) showed that x86 could match the Raspberry Pi form factor with roughly the same idle power and much better peak performance. However, the parent is correct that Intel couldn't (or wasn't willing to) match the price point.

my123 6y ago
Raspberry Pis are on much older Arm architectures/manufacturing processes, with nowhere near the performance of a smartphone, and with very reduced energy efficiency. Raspberry Pi 3 was a Cortex-A53 back ported to 40nm outright. Raspberry Pi 4 is on 28nm. (for comparison, Apple A8 and Snapdragon 810 were on 20nm already, in 2014-15) It runs with a Cortex-A72 at a low clock (1.5GHz, phones even are at twice that clock nowadays) and quite high power consumption because of the process node. The memory interface is narrow (32-bit bus, phones ship with a 64-bit bus and laptops/desktops with a 128b one) at a low data rate (LPDDR4-3200). In addition to that, the CPU can only use 5GB/sec of it, with the remainder being reserved for the GPU only. Those were some of the sacrifices needed to reach this price point. (and why it isn't representative at all of the performance of higher-end ARMs)
- vardump 6y ago
  Yeah, Raspberry Pi needs a 64-bit memory bus pretty badly. Hopefully it's feasible in the future without compromising cost.
JoshTriplett 6y ago
The Raspberry Pi is also more solder-friendly, with GPIO and similar. The Compute Stick makes sense if you're going to connect to well-defined ports.
Laforet 6y ago
The earlier models of compute stick had serious EMF issues with their USB and 2.4Ghz radio to the point that some configurations were practically unusable. This turned a lot of people away and it never got popular. Not to mention they ran pretty hot even with active cooling. At the same time Intel was heavily subsidizing their x86 mobile SoCs to tablet manufacturers and for a while it was actually quite competitive price wise but it ultimately went bothered.

mkaic 6y ago

Atomic Pi is pretty darn close, though it's twice the size. Severely underrate SBC imo