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If you need a computer it’s better to use a mini pc form factor from a major vendor that benefits from economies of scale. NUC’s aren’t great value. You can get

If you need a computer it’s better to use a mini pc form factor from a major vendor that benefits from economies of scale. NUC’s aren’t great value. You can get used HP and Dell stuff used from IT recyclers for ~$150 that do circles around the Pi in terms of performance. I never understood the fascination with the Pi. Especially with all the options today.

hammyhavoc 3y ago
Uh, ARM, low power, and GPIO. The fascination is in its applications beyond a desktop computer. It was dirt-cheap for what it did and enabled.
- bsder 3y ago
  A Beaglebone Black is a FAR better fit for the description of "ARM, low power, and GPIO". A Beaglebone Black actually runs off of a 5V 500mA USB interface unlike the RPis that require non-standard 5V multi-Amp USB supplies. And it's GPIO system (along with everything else) is well documented and doesn't require NDAs. And the RPi was only dirt cheap while it was being subsidized by Broadcom. Now that it's not, the RPI is more expensive than low end x86s that run rings around them.
  - hammyhavoc 3y ago
    The word "was" is doing a lot of heavy-lifting here. The Black was 2013, and the Pi was 2012, mate. Arguably, the branding of the Pi is much better too, and they conquered the education market, and are widely available at various retailers. Not to mention the Pi compute modules being used in a lot of products by the likes of Korg. Point of the Pi wasn't perf, even on release.
bsder 3y ago
> I never understood the fascination with the Pi. Ecosystem. Everybody was gaga over the RPi so if you wanted to do "Task X" you could find an online tutorial for it. Of course, almost everything that doesn't involve an RPi Hat also works just fine on standard Linux machines. But not everybody gets that. I watched this play out in real time. People wanted Octoprint to drive several 3D printers. They wanted one per printer and bought a whole bunch of RPi stuff. I pointed out that a used x86 desktop of any flavor was way cheaper and far more powerful, but shrug. Not my circus; not my monkeys.
- washadjeffmad 3y ago
  True, although Octoprint is typically for making local devices network connectable to receive and manage prints. A traditional PC is better if it's expected to do any processing of models, but a $5 rpi0w powered by the bus is generally plenty. Our challenge was scalability and portability. Printers in our farms often moved between labs and offices, and toting a whole PC with each one would have been limiting to where they could be set up, as well as create potential conflicts with IT policy. It was also simpler to image SD cards than hard drives (or to work with IT to create and manage deployable configurations). In the end, $35/printer for raspi3b+s wasn't a big overall expense, unlike the time spent on training and maintenance. Now we pay 10x more for faster, higher quality printers that don't break down AND include network ports, but we only need 1/5th as many to operate at the same capacity.
flounder3 3y ago
NUCs are a tremendous value over previous generation surplus hardware in areas where the cost of electricity has skyrocketed (SF Bay Area). We’re talking more than one order of magnitude less power consumption when you compare to 2-3+ generations ago.

hammyhavoc 3y ago

Uh, ARM, low power, and GPIO. The fascination is in its applications beyond a desktop computer. It was dirt-cheap for what it did and enabled.

bsder 3y ago
A Beaglebone Black is a FAR better fit for the description of "ARM, low power, and GPIO". A Beaglebone Black actually runs off of a 5V 500mA USB interface unlike the RPis that require non-standard 5V multi-Amp USB supplies. And it's GPIO system (along with everything else) is well documented and doesn't require NDAs. And the RPi was only dirt cheap while it was being subsidized by Broadcom. Now that it's not, the RPI is more expensive than low end x86s that run rings around them.
- hammyhavoc 3y ago
  The word "was" is doing a lot of heavy-lifting here. The Black was 2013, and the Pi was 2012, mate. Arguably, the branding of the Pi is much better too, and they conquered the education market, and are widely available at various retailers. Not to mention the Pi compute modules being used in a lot of products by the likes of Korg. Point of the Pi wasn't perf, even on release.

bsder 3y ago

> I never understood the fascination with the Pi. Ecosystem. Everybody was gaga over the RPi so if you wanted to do "Task X" you could find an online tutorial for it. Of course, almost everything that doesn't involve an RPi Hat also works just fine on standard Linux machines. But not everybody gets that. I watched this play out in real time. People wanted Octoprint to drive several 3D printers. They wanted one per printer and bought a whole bunch of RPi stuff. I pointed out that a used x86 desktop of any flavor was way cheaper and far more powerful, but shrug. Not my circus; not my monkeys.

washadjeffmad 3y ago
True, although Octoprint is typically for making local devices network connectable to receive and manage prints. A traditional PC is better if it's expected to do any processing of models, but a $5 rpi0w powered by the bus is generally plenty. Our challenge was scalability and portability. Printers in our farms often moved between labs and offices, and toting a whole PC with each one would have been limiting to where they could be set up, as well as create potential conflicts with IT policy. It was also simpler to image SD cards than hard drives (or to work with IT to create and manage deployable configurations). In the end, $35/printer for raspi3b+s wasn't a big overall expense, unlike the time spent on training and maintenance. Now we pay 10x more for faster, higher quality printers that don't break down AND include network ports, but we only need 1/5th as many to operate at the same capacity.

flounder3 3y ago

NUCs are a tremendous value over previous generation surplus hardware in areas where the cost of electricity has skyrocketed (SF Bay Area). We’re talking more than one order of magnitude less power consumption when you compare to 2-3+ generations ago.