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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Raspberry Pi 5 prices etc...
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Grogster Admin Group  Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 10008 |
Modern hardware prices are INSANE. I looked at buying a standard PI5 with 4GB of RAM - $250 now. Screw that. I wanted it, to build a FreeNAS machine, and use external USB3 drives. I was GIVEN FOR FREE this week, two dual-core 3GHz HP machines with 4GB of RAM and 250GB SSD's running Windoze 10. I plan to make use of one of these, with a big HDD, and something like FreeNAS, which will be more then happy on a dual-core 3GHz machine and 4GB of ram, so long as I don't try to use ZFS. New hardware prices are out of control cos of the AI crap. A good time to reuse old PC's that WON'T run Windoze 11, but would be perfectly happy with some form of Linux. Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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Mixtel90 Guru  Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 9021 |
Raspberry Pi prices have been getting sillier for a while now but that sounds expensive. the 4GB version is a touch over £100 here including VAT but plus carriage. You can get a miniPC on AliExpress with 8GB RAM and 256 GB SSD for around £140 at the moment, including shipping and taxes, all boxed up in a metal case with HDMI, VGA, 2 GbE ports and 4 USBs. Slowish Celeron CPU though. Costs about twice the price for a faster Celeron. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| matherp Guru Joined: 11/12/2012 Location: United KingdomPosts: 11733 |
ExplainingComputers was talking about this. The problem for the Pi5 is using a high density single RAM chip which is silly expensive. DDR4 hasn't been hit so badly and you can bet those cheap devices are DDR4 (or even less) |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 9021 |
Ah, that would make sense. They will almost certainly be Chinese manufactured RAM too. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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Martin H. Guru Joined: 04/06/2022 Location: GermanyPosts: 1498 |
In my opinion, the Pi 5 seems a bit overkill for a USB NAS. A Pi 4 should be able to do the same job here, as well as your dual-core 3GHz HP machines with 4GB of RAM. The bottleneck isn’t the CPU speed, but the USB and network speeds. I haven’t bought a Pi 5 to replace my Pi4 Retropi. Instead, I’ve got a €150 N100 mini PC running Batocera. 'no comment |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 9021 |
I love miniPCs, especially silent ones. :) My days of messing about with towers full of fans are gone now - I prefer silence to performance. lol Need more storage? add another NAS, or even the 3TB USB3 drive that it feels like I will never fill with anything useful... Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2049 |
ebay, used Panasonic Toughpad (tablet) or toughbook (laptop). I have three toughbooks and they are bomb proof. Not sleek and cute so no aftermarket. |
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| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 9021 |
My last (fanless) NUC cost me £37. i5, 8GB RAM, 120GB HDD. It's running linux rather nicely. :) Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
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| PhenixRising Guru Joined: 07/11/2023 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2049 |
I love those things, mine has the awesome N100. But the Toughbook, you really can run over with a car. Mine have been dropped repeatedly on the factory floor and are always covered in hydraulic oil. I still have a spinning hard drive and if the ambient temp is low, the internal heater kicks in 😂🤣 Edited 2026-08-08 04:09 by PhenixRising |
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| GerryL Regular Member  Joined: 24/01/2019 Location: AustraliaPosts: 46 |
Modern hardware prices may be insane today but not as insane as the good old days. I was looking through a July 1965 Electronics Australia the other day and it had a Fairchild advert for transistors and micro-circuits (RTL series) and it quoted the cheapest transistor (2N3691, min order 100) at 5 shillings AU, or about US$6 today. I’m guessing a modern mid-range micro-controller would have about 20 million transistors so if you decided to bread-board one up on the kitchen table in 1965 it would set you back about US$120,000,000 in todays money. Of course if you just wanted a JK flip flop then they went for 92 shillings or approx. US$110 in today’s money. Hobbies were clearly very expensive back in those.  Gerry |
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| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 10008 |
Yes, I have a silent NUC machine for my mediaplayer in my bedroom, cos I don't want all the fan noise, but the server lives in the office, and I don't sleep in there, so I don't care if it is a traditional desktop or tower that whirrs all night where it is.   The DDR5 RAM would certainly explain the cost these daze.... The Pi thing is an interesting development curve, and it was such a brilliant original idea, costing only fifty bucks back then, it outsold every other mini-PC on the market. But the development of the Pi range has seen them grow more and more grunty, with dual-monitor support now, GB network, WiFi, BT, PCIe support for things like M.2 SSD's etc.... Gone are the days when you used a Pi, cos it was cheap and reasonably easy to get some code running on it to use the I/O pins. Today, people seem to using(or trying to) the Pi's as a full-blown multi-monitor PC setup which I never thought they were ever gonna be used for. There are a plethora of PC's both old and new, which can very happily run Linux or even Windoze, if you want the full multi-monitor desktop type computer system. It seems odd to me, that the Pi's have tried to go down that path, rather then sticking to their root concept of bare-bones, basic controller type things. But that's only my 2c. Raspberry Pi Foundation are free to do whatever they want, but it feels like a similar story to me in the business world - "Advance or die." People ARE very fickle, so quickly loose interest, I suppose, if you are not coming out with the new model with go-faster stripes. PS: @ Gerry - good point. My first USB flash drive was 256MB and cost about the same. A buck a MB in those days. Now it's ROUGHLY a buck a GB, but before all the RAM craziness, it was like 35c or so a GB. Edited 2026-08-08 10:06 by Grogster Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| JohnS Guru Joined: 18/11/2011 Location: United KingdomPosts: 4364 |
I suppose the Pico is the path away from the Linux/etc Pi path. (Shh, don't mention fuzix) John |
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| Martin H. Guru Joined: 04/06/2022 Location: GermanyPosts: 1498 |
Here’s something relevant to the topic… a DIY home server for around €240 unfortunately in German 'no comment |
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