SBC.
Single Board Computer.
I love them…They are the perfect example of a solution looking for a problem for me…. I love solutions almost as much as I love problems.
Anyway, I have a few single board computers, they are in my garage. Doing nothing….Well, actually, they are waiting for me to have a problem that they can solve.
What in the world am I talking about?
Small cheap computers. They usually run Linux. Are not super friendly and really dont do anything.
They are too small and two under powered to do much of anything. But they are so cute and so cheap that most geeks own at least one.
The crazy thing is that the most popular (called, of all things, a Rasberry Pi) has sold millions.
Thats a lot of problems. Or solutions. Im not really sure which.
Anyway, they have a network port (or not in some versions), a video port (or not in some versions), an SD card for storage (in most cases) and (sometimes) some input and output ports that can be hooked to other things.
I have one Pi at work and one at home. Neither are powered up, but I got an idea last week for the Pi at home.
(Will blog about that if I get around to doing it).
I had another one called a BeagleBoneBlack. It was like a Pi on steroids. Bigger, faster, more powerful. Only it was smaller. I sold it to a guy at work that wants to make it his home brew beer controller.
Anyway the point of this blog is to say this; there is a new version of the Beagle coming.
http://www.adafruit.com/blog/2014/11/07/breaking-news-beagleboard-x15/
Im pretty excited for it as it will mean harder problems can be solved with it.
No news yet on its price, but I suspect it will be 50 bucks or less. (To keep it inline with with its brothers).
So. If you are in the hunt for an SBC, perhaps this new version will fit the bill?
EDIT. Not a day or more latter and yet another update to the Pi itself.
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2380390/freshly-harvested-raspberry-pi-model-a-hits-stores
Note, the model A Pi does not have an Ethernet port. To me this totally kills it. Its a computer with no (as in zero) out of the box connectivity.
Might be Ok to run a microwave oven or something, but as for it actually being useful, not so much.
Sure, the price is hard to beat. Sure there might be the odd problem it could be a solution for…. but for me, not so much.
What I am looking for is a computer that is under 50 bucks and has wifi, ethernet and bluetooth. Now that would a very cool solution that I have many problems it could solve.
