Pi5 (4GB RAM).-.$60.00
M.2 HAT+ - $12.00
Power Supply - $13.60
Total $85.60
Even after purchasing a case (if you want one) and the NVMe drive of your choice, that doesn't seem too bad. I do wish there were 2 M.2 slots so that there could be redundancy. Is there anything else I'm missing here?
- Somewhat faster multicore performance, identical single core performance
- Disk buses run at full speed
- Runs any standard x86-64 OS and software instead of Pi/Arm specific ones
- Has double the RAM
- Comes with a 256 GB m.2 SSD (unfortunately not an option to buy without), can be replaced if you want more.
- Comes with the case
For slightly more you can get one with 2 drive bays in the factory case instead of having to build some external drive mount solution e.g. https://www.amazon.com/Beelink-4-Cores-N5095-Computer-Ethern.... If you aren't as worried on the CPU performance there are options in the $80 range that still hold these other advantages.
Pi's are fun but they are slightly overhyped in terms of the absolute value for things you can do with a standard PC like build a NAS, host a server, or use as an actual PC. The biggest values are where the 1 GB RAM model can do more than you need and it's a really great value for a non-used device or where the Pi's non high speed interfaces are a benefit like IP KVMs where the GPIO can control the motheboard, the CSI can capture the HDMI output, the USB OTG can act as the USB/CD drive/Keyboard/Mouse, the NIC/Wi-fi make it easy to access, and the size makes it fit inside existing equipment without issue.
The Pi obsession truly boggles my mind. I can see it with the RP2040 etc but a regular Pi? Why?
I bought several Pi 4 2GB models for $30 back before COVID hit. At that price point they make sense for running some dedicated things, like my DNS servers, GPS-synchronized NTP server and such.
But yeah, at $85, even with a bit better performance, I'm not seeing it.
Does your listing not show “power adapter” in the included components?
My use case would be Time Machine backups over my home WiFi network. Everything I’ve seen is either expensive or has mixed reviews for this use case.
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/radxas-sata-hat-makes...
Looks like he got near 100 MB/sec writing (and higher read) on Samba from it (capable of saturating 1 Gbps network) in testing and almost saturating a 2.5Gbps link with another adapter: https://github.com/geerlingguy/raspberry-pi-pcie-devices/iss...
(He's got several other blogs and YouTube videos in/around RPi topics.)