New 1 GHz Raspberry PI Zero for US$5

[sje]

New 1 GHz 512 MiB Raspberry PI Zero for US$5 -- or free with the purchase of the current issue of MagPi magazine.

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspberry-pi-zero/

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The board has no Ethernet port, so some kind of micro-USB/100baseT adapter is needed to make a (conventional) cluster element. A power source with a micro-USB output is also required, as is a micro-SD card.

[brtzsnr]

Unfortunately none of the boards on the market are geared towards building a cluster. You always need: storage, power and ethernet. Ideally, a device would have a single port that can both power on the device and network boot.

This would be a nice hardware project, however. I could also be cheaper without all fancy IO ports. Want to expand your cluster? Fine, buy 100$ worth of 1$ devices.

[matthewlai]

Unfortunately none of the boards on the market are geared towards building a cluster. You always need: storage, power and ethernet. Ideally, a device would have a single port that can both power on the device and network boot.

This would be a nice hardware project, however. I could also be cheaper without all fancy IO ports. Want to expand your cluster? Fine, buy 100$ worth of 1$ devices.

From the FAQ -

What about the Compute Module?
We expect to introduce a BCM2836-based Compute Module in the medium term, but for now we’re focused on getting Raspberry Pi 2 Model B out of the door.

BCM2836 is the faster chip in RPi 2.

For powering and ethernet on the same port, there's PoE that's popular in certain markets (eg. IP surveillance cameras). It seems highly unlikely that there will be a PoE version of RPi, though. It's a relatively unknown standard in the consumer world, and most people (everyone except people building clusters) will have no need for it, since it requires special hardware to inject power into ethernet as well.

[brtzsnr]

This is the compute module https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspbe ... w-product/. It needs even more additional hardware to connect it.

[matthewlai]

This is the compute module https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspbe ... w-product/. It needs even more additional hardware to connect it.

That's the one based on the old chip I think. A new one is coming out with the new chip. Will probably have the same form factor though.

May be interesting to design a "motherboard" that can take on a few (or more) compute modules. I may do that if I ever find time. Been a while since I last designed a PCB.

At $30/ea they probably won't be competitive with x86 servers, though, on both performance/$ and performance/W basis. A $30 version based on the new quad core chip may be close to competitive.

[Richard Allbert]

Amazing little device, been playing with it and the pi 2 a lot recently.

The pi 2 is collecting weather & motion data (that's what everyone does, right ? )

I compiled Xboard and my engine on the pi zero with no issues, and if FICS give me an account (fingers crossed), I'll put my engine on the server 24/7 using the pi zero.

For the price these computers are incredible.