Raspberry Pi Got Cheaper and More Powerful

Raspberry Pi was a genuinely interesting idea to begin with. It was – and still is – a general purpose miniature computer. The first model created by the Raspberry Pi Foundation cost $20 to $25, and was meant to bring computers and programming within reach for millions of people. The latest version of the computer, Raspberry Pi Zero, is more powerful than any of its predecessors, and even cheaper – it only costs $5, less than what you would spend playing royal vegas casino games on a day.

Let’s see what the miniature computer hides under its (non-existing) hood:

– A Broadcom BCM2835 application processor with a 1GHz ARM11 core (40% faster than Raspberry Pi 1)
– 512MB of LPDDR2 SDRAM
– A micro-SD card slot
– A mini-HDMI socket for 1080p60 video output
– Micro-USB sockets for data and power
– An unpopulated 40-pin GPIO header

What makes it interesting is that it’s small – its measurements are 65mm x 30mm x 5mm, smaller than an average playing card. To make things even more interesting, the Raspberry Foundation is giving away the Raspberry Pi Zero free with its MagPi magazine.

Some of you might ask what you could use the Raspberry Pi for. Well, given its nature as a general purpose mini-computer, it can be used in a series of ways. If you are looking for inspiration, you can take a look at the Official Raspberry Pi Projects book, which covers the instructions on how to get started with your own project, as well as dozens of community projects based on the Pi discussed in detail. Or you can take a look at the list of the Raspberry Pi Challenge 2015 organized by the Department of Computer Science at the University of York.

The possibilities offered by Raspberry Pi are amazing. Among the most impressive real life uses of the mini-computer include a voice-controller robotic arm, a fridge sensor that detects the temperature of beer and adjusts the fridge temperature accordingly, or a robotic chicken that monitors how often you open a cupboard, and tweets about your dietary sins to your followers.

The Raspberry Pi was at the base of even more insanely interesting projects in the past. For example, developer Nathan Broadbent used it to re-imagine the microwave, adding voice control and Twitter capabilities. Michael Teeuw has used the Pi to add extra capabilities to his home mirror – it now shows the time, the weather and the latest news. But there are many more amazing projects you can use the cheap and powerful computer for – and quite a few of them are commercially viable as well.