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Submitted via IRC for Bytram
Rock Pi X Intel Cherry Trail Board to Sell for as low as $39
Most low cost (sub $100) single board computers are based on Arm processors because Intel processors are normally more expensive, but there are some exceptions with AAEON Up Board and Atomic Pi both powered by an Intel Atom x5-Z8350 processor and selling for $99 and $35 respectively.
The former follows Raspberry Pi form factor and is easy to use, but the latter requires some more work to wire power supply unless you buy an extra baseboard. There should however soon be a third option for low-cost Intel SBCs with Radxa Rock Pi X board powered by an Intel Atom x5-Z8300 Cherry Trail processor and is expected to sell for as little as $39.
Rock Pi X just showed up in Hackerboards database, and there will be two models, namely Rock Pi X model A and Rock Pi X model B with the following specifications:
- SoC – Intel Atom x5-Z8300 “Cherry Trail” quad-core processor @ 1.44 GHz / 1.84 GHz (Turbo) with Intel Gen8 HD graphics @ 500 MHz
- System Memory – 1 GB, 2 GB. or 4GB LPDDR3-1866
- Storage – MicroSD card socket, eMMC flash socket
- Video Output / Display I/F – HDMI 1.4 port up to 4K @ 30 Hz, eDP and MIPI DSI connectors
- Audio I/O – Via HDMI, 3.5mm audio jack
- Connectivity
- Gigabit Ethernet
- Model B only – 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac and Bluetooth 4.2 Classic + LE
- USB – 1x USB 3.0 port, 3x USB 2.0 host ports, 1x USB OTG Type-C port
- Camera I/F – MIPI CSI connector
- Expansion – 40-pin Raspberry Pi compatible header with GPIOs, 2x ADC, 2x PWM, 2x I2C
- Misc – RTC
- Power Supply
- 5V-20V up to 3A/1A Via USB-C port with QC and PD fast charging support;
- AXP288C PMIC
- Model B only – optional PoE support via additional HAT
- Dimensions – 85 x 52 mm
[...] Apart from the Intel processor and the lack of an M.2 slot, the specifications are very similar to the company’s Arm-based Rock Pi 4 SBC with the differences between model A and model B being the addition of a wireless module and support for PoE for the latter. If you’re worried about cooling, a variant of Rock Pi 4 heatsink ($7.99) will certainly be made.
(Score: 2) by theluggage on Friday September 13 2019, @11:53AM
I used a Raspberry Pi 2 as a "set-top box" running Kodi (& acting as a front end to TVHeadEnd PVR running in a server in another room) for a while, and it was very effective (not 4k, but this was a couple of years ago now) - switched to a FireTV mainly to get Netflix/Amazon Prime./Spotify without endless hacking (legal or otherwise). Not unexpected, since the Pi is basically built around an off-the-shelf set-top-box system-on-a-chip that supports hardware H264 etc.
One of the stated aims of Raspberry Pi has always been to get more people interested in coding - part of that is via robotics etc. but another aspect is just having a really cheap computer that you, or the kids, can screw up without losing too much sleep - for software catastrophes, just re-flash the SD card and start again.
Not sure why you'd use a RasPi or other Pi-alike as a desktop replacement when a Chromebook or surplus/used laptop would be a much neater solution, but I'm not sure that's the plan - its not like they jacked up the price to get the extra power, that's just what $40 worth of hardware using off-the-shelf chippery does in 2019... For my money, the attractive feature of the Pi4 is that they seem to have improved the i/o bottleneck of the Pi1/2/3 whereby all of the networking and USB was done by a single, slightly flakey OTG USB 2 port.