[Zuph]

I'll be interested to see how this progresses. With any luck, it'll open up a market of cheap, well-distributed SOMs, similar to the Pi opening up a market for cheap, well-distributed ARM/Linux Dev Boards.

The situation's surprisingly similar: Powerful ARM Dev boards existed before the Pi, but the price was steep, they couldn't be found in traditional distribution channels, and the OS/Driver support was poor at best. This is, more or less, the place we're at with embedded SOMs.

[fit2rule]

There are really great cheap SOC's out there, in ARM land, to play with.

Just look at these guys: http://www.acmesystems.it/aria

Look, the rPi started off as a play-thing for kids, and there is now a valid rPi generation. It is expanding as a platform. But: in the industrial world, the rPi is a small fish. You can get an rPi precisely because some other industry has already driven the demand/price/costs down for it to be affordable/profitable to build a new brand around what is, a common industry practice/device mind-set.

[tcas]

There are, but they aren't close in specs and price to this one. The AT91 series are completely different in terms of functionality vs the Broadcom. The AT91SAM9 series don't even have a floating point unit last time I checked. This chip can do full 1080p h264 encoding/decoding/and support that resolution for display output (HDMI and DSI). This also has flash storage and 2x more ram onboard.

This might be a close equivalent, but is more expensive, and will almost certainly require a large order to get those prices: http://www.variscite.com/products/system-on-module-som/corte...

If this brings down prices of the commercial SoM vendors that benefits all of us however.

[ris]

You really see these being sold in Radio Shack?

With Pis, all the average person needed was a regular keyboard, mouse & monitor to plug in. That's why it worked. That's all been thrown out here.

[peteforde]

I think you're gravely misunderstanding the intended goal and target user for this device. It's not "for consumers" but a path for hardware developers to prototype with a full Pi and then ship with a custom unit that's been configured as needed - without having to modify your code.

[ris]

Right, but what I've said in other replies, why can the Pi do this any better than any of the existing SO-DIMM modules on the market?

[Zuph]

Nope, I don't see these being sold in Radio Shack. The world of electronics distribution reaches way beyond Radio Shack.

I mean: Before the Raspberry Pi, there were Linux-capable ARM Dev Boards, but the vast majority of them were niche items, over $150, and you had to call up the manufacturer and convince them to sell you one. (oh, and don't you dare use this in production without securing a larger purchase agreement!) Now, there's a proliferation of sub-$100 Linux-capable boards being sold by all the distribution houses, in large quantities, with no or limited restrictions on use in production.

I hope this move from the Raspberry Pi foundation does the same thing for OEM SOMs. Right now, there are only a handful of SOMs on Digikey/Mouser, most with fewer than 100 units in stock, all (that I can find) over $100, with zero community of support. Most of the companies with strong reputations in the market require a phone call before they'll even agree to sell you units for sampling.

[ris]

"Before the Raspberry Pi, there were Linux-capable ARM Dev Boards, but the vast majority of them were niche items, over $150... Now, there's a proliferation of sub-$100 Linux-capable boards..."

If anything started this it was the BeagleBoard released by TI well before the Pi. You can get a feel for how much influence it had from the fact that half the boards released these days are named *Board in a similar way. MinnowBoard, CubieBoard, DragonBoard, OwlBoard, MarsBoard, Arndale Board, PandaBoard, CosmicBoard... I could go on...

I'm no Raspberry Pi hater, but let's just not go all history-revisionism here.

[fit2rule]

Here in Austria, at least, any Conrad's has a "raspberry pi accessory" shelf. Sure, its Conrads .. but then again its Conrads. That is about as Big Mac Consumer as you are going to get.

I know of at least a few other places, here in Vienna, where you can get an rPi pretty much any time of day by vending machine. wtf, you're still using Radio Shack, lol.. ")

[jnbiche]

My local Radio Shack carries both Arduinos and various Propeller microcontrollers, along with sundry components for them (LCDs, wifi, bluetooth, etc). It also sells various breadboards and some really cool individual integrated circuits (hex and other logic gates), MOSFETs, CMOSs, and bunches of other cool stuff. And I'm not in a huge city or in California.

If you're into hobby electronics, it's worth checking out Radio Shack if you've not been in one for a while. They carry much more than just electronic kits for kids.

But I agree that the target market for these is more professional engineers looking to take a prototype into smalltime production, or an early protype into something more refined.

[MrMeker]

The normal RaspberryPi is available at Radio Shack. http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=289254...