Programming is used everywhere. Electronics devices, smartphones, gaming, software, etc. Any and every piece of technology involves programming these days. Raspberry Pi is one of the hot technologies that involves programming and are an integral part of our lives.
Let’s begin with a small introduction to Raspberry Pi:
What is Raspberry Pi?
Raspberry Pi is a low cost, credit card-sized computer that enables people of all ages to explore computing, and to learn how to program in languages like Scratch and Python. Raspberry Pi is a project initiated by Eben Upton and developed in U.K by Raspberry Pi foundation in 2009. Raspberry Pi supports several Programming Languages like Scratch, Python, Node.js, C, C++, Java, Perl, HTML5, JavaScript, JQuery, etc.
Raspberry Pi is capable of doing everything that a desktop computer can do, from browsing the internet and playing high-definition video, to creating spreadsheets, word processing, and playing games. By default, it supports Python as the educational language.
Moreover, Raspberry Pi has been used in a wide array of digital maker projects like music machines, weather stations, tweeting birdhouses with infrared cameras and more
In 2012, a small single board computer equipped with microcontroller chips and I/O connectors with more flexibilities became hugely popular because of its uniqueness and captured the curiosity of tech journalists, professionals, tech loving guys, and enthusiasts around the world.
In 2014, the Raspberry Pi Foundation UK launched the Compute Module, which was packaged a Raspberry Pi Model B into a module for use as a part of embedded systems to encourage their use.
Benefits & Features of Raspberry Pi:
- Raspberry Pi provides a fun environment for experimenting with programming and electronics.
- It’s simple, open and easy to maintain computer for school kids.
- It is a perfect adaptive technology, where it is able to display images or play videos at 1080p high definition resolution.
- It is energy efficient and provides a greener and ethical alternative for small businesses.
- Raspberry Pi provides a simple and easy way to control electrical components/sensors using software. The main advantage of Raspberry pi is that it is small in size and at the same time has all the functions of a laptop and a desktop.
- Raspberry Pi consumes very less power, only about five to seven watts of electricity.
- Raspberry Pi system are noise free, which is one of the great thing as you will not find this is even in computers.
- Raspberry Pi has this attractive feature of future expansion capabilities. This feature is enticing many professional.
- It is very affordable compared to branded computers that are commercially available.
- It is armed with built-in HDMI capable graphics.
- Raspberry Pi can be overclocked if there are performance problems with the application used.
- The ability to store on an SD card makes it easy to swap with other SD cards running other GNU/Linux distributions to quickly and easily change the functionality of the Pi.
Why kids need to learn Raspberry Pi?
Here are some reasons why it is imperative for kids to learn Raspberry Pi:
- Enhance your child’s knowledge on basic electronics
- Starting point to develop your child’s innovative abilities
- Enhance their analytics ability
- Is very easy and handy to use
- Child will develop simple programming skills
- Can be applied to day to day life applications
- Child can create fun projects which can be very innovative
Different Raspberry Pi Models:
These are different models available in Raspberry Pi. They are as follows:
- Pi 2 Model B
- Pi 3 Model B
- Pi Zero
- Pi 1 Model B+
- Pi 1 Model A+.
Pi 2 Model B:
Pi 2 Model B is the second generation of the Raspberry Pi. The Pi 2 is similar to Pi 1 Model B+ in many ways, except that it uses a 900MHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A7 CPU and has 1GB RAM. The Pi 2 is compatible with first generation boards, and is the recommended model for schools.
Pi 3 Model B:
The Pi 3 Model B uses a 1.2GHz 64-bit quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 CPU, has 1GB RAM, integrated 802.11n wireless LAN, and Bluetooth 4.1.
Pi Zero:
The Pi Zero is half the size of a Model A+, with a 1 Ghz single-core CPU and 512MB RAM, and mini-HDMI and USB On-The-Go ports.
Pi 1 Model B+:
The Model B+ is the final revision of the original Raspberry Pi. It has 512MB RAM (twice as much as the A+), four USB ports, 40 GPIO pins, and an Ethernet port.
Pi 1 Model A+:
The Model A+ is the low-cost variant of the Raspberry Pi. It has 256MB RAM, one USB port, 40 GPIO pins and no Ethernet port.
How powerful is it?
The GPU is capable of 1Gpixel/s, 1.5Gtexel/s or 24 GFLOPs of general purpose compute and features a bunch of texture filtering and DMA infrastructure. This means that graphics capabilities are roughly equivalent to the original Xbox’s level of performance. Overall, the real-world performance for models A, A+, B & B+ is something like a 300MHz Pentium 2, only with much better graphics. The Model 2B is approximately equivalent to an Athlon Thunderbird running at 1.1GHz and has much higher quality graphics as in previous models. The Model 3B is around 50% faster than the 2B.
What you Can and Can’t do with Raspberry Pi 2:
Let’s look at what you can and can’t do with a Raspberry Pi 2, according to Curtis Franklin Jr, Executive Editor for technical content at InformationWeek:
- You can run Windows 10 Embedded— Windows 10 Embedded is a command-line version of the OS core designed to power control systems, kiosks, appliances, and other devices for which the Windows user interface isn’t required. It allows developers to use the Microsoft developer tools and attach the embedded devices to a network under Microsoft Active Directory control and management.
- You can’t run Microsoft Office— Office won’t run on Windows 10 Embedded because the products need the user interface pieces that the Embedded product doesn’t have.
- You can build a better Supercomputer— People are building Raspberry Pi supercomputers with the Model A. With more memory and four times as many compute cores on each device, it is now possible to build a much more capable supercomputer at minimal cost.
- You can teach people to code – Computer programming has become one of the “must-have” skills. The Raspberry Pi 2 has blinky lights to show whether the programmer is doing the right thing.
- You can’t take a photograph of it – It’s more like you don’t want to take a flash photograph of the Raspberry Pi 2. This because, the intensive and sudden light of a flash at a close range will turn off the computer, since the key component is photo sensitive.
- You Can Build a Cloud – Unlike other single board embedded computers, the Raspberry Pi 2 has all the components you need to put a project into the Cloud.
We hope that we have given a clear picture of Raspberry Pi. We are looking forward for your comments in the comment section below. Apart from this, if you need any further clarifications, you can email us at enquiry@acadgild.com.
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