Raspberry Pi packs more power into its $15 Zero 2 W board

[rcjordan]

https://www.engadget.com/raspberry-pi-zero-2-w-board-102556183.html

[littleman]

There is a version of RISC OS called RISC OS Direct which has a lot of modern-ish features, but is still very light.  I bet it would run very well on the Zero 2 W.  One could have a functional computer for around $25 including accessories.   I might have to play with that setup just for kicks.

[Drastic]

It is amazing what you get for 15 bucks.

[littleman]

Yeah, it really is.  A kid with just a little money and an internet connection could give himself quite an tech education.  It is great how little barriers there are to learning these days.

[littleman]

Here is a walkthrough if anyone is interested.

[littleman]

A better walk around.

[ergophobe]

I was mostly curious about power consumption. He has a nice bit on that in section 8

[littleman]

Yeah, that was interesting; 0.62W at idle & 2.12W under load.

[ergophobe]

It was one of the things that made me skeptical of running a whole computer just to run Pi Hole, for example.

To be honest, my main reason is laziness. But some percentage, let's say 10%, is my router setup already has what I think is a pretty high power draw. Now that I realize that a Pi Zero or Pi 2 would likely average less than 1W as it would spend most of its time at idle or near idle in applications like that, I'm left with the 90% excuse of my laziness.

Still, seeing how low the power draw is really does make me more interested.

[littleman]

>I'm left with the 90% excuse of my laziness.

At least you are being honest with yourself  .

[ergophobe]

I've lived with myself for 58 years, so I've developed a sense of my weaknesses and foibles. And, as I write that, it occurs to me that I've also learned to forgive some of them too.

[littleman]

One remarkable aspect of the board is the Raspberry-designed RP3A0 system-in-package, which includes the four CPUs and 512 MB of RAM all on the same chip ... y combining four cores tightly with on-chip memory, the Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W is definitely the most energy-efficient Pi.

Hackaday tests the Pi zero 2 w under loads

[ergophobe]

How to Watch Disney+, Netflix, Prime Video, and Plex With Raspberry Pi
https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/netflix-amazon-video-plex-raspberry-pi/

[ergophobe]

THE FUTURE OF COMPUTERS IS ONLY $4 AWAY, WITH RASPBERRY PI CEO EBEN UPTON

https://www.theverge.com/22966155/raspberry-pi-ceo-interview-eben-upton-computer-chip-shortage-diy