Must fight temptation to buy an overpriced raspberry pi
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There are also a lot of mini PCs that are comparable in price to a Raspberry Pi 5 once you factor in the cost of a case, SD card, and power supply for the Pi.
Notable mention, amd64 chipsets are more widely supported than ARM.
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
ARM life!
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If you have the lid closed, you're looking at 3 to 15 watts to have a laptop running in the background doing some basic server shit.
Maybe a little more under high load, but those are going to be intermittent and not constant.
I'm just saying it's not that much more electricity usage, and the recycling more than offsets the CO2.
Laptop performance when closed is quite variable, but depending on where you live, each 10W of idle consumption 24/7/365 could cost you somewhere around $20/yr (assumes @$0.20/kWh, YMMV). This isn't overwhelming on it's own, but it is "cost difference between a junked laptop and a Raspberry Pi" kinda money.
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
It's low power that is still making arm small computers popular. It's impossible to get a pc down into the 2-5 Watt power consumption range and over time it's the electrical costs that add up. I would suggest the RPI5 is the thing to get because it's expensive for what it is and more performance is available from other options supported by armbian.
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The Zero 2W is cheaper and pretty much the same spec as the Pi 3.
Oh what I was about to correct you but apparently I always assumed the Zero 2 had the dual core chip of the Pi 2, not a quad core
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Where are these cheap e waste laptops with gpio and actually low power?
No gpio but old centrino laptops make excellent low power servers. My primary server was a first gen centrino from 2011 up until recently and I think it only used 12w idle after putting a SSD in there. Had it's own UPS built in.
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That word made me hear the whole thing in an Australian accent.
wrote last edited by [email protected]True, but we don't really say landfill, rather "tip".. So..
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
I personally needed the Pi for its Arm architecture.
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Facebook marketplace, kjiji, etc
Everyone here thinks their shit tier 2018 laptop is made of gold or something.
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Yeah, my pi sips energy very sparingly. Even an old laptop is going to be drawing more just to power itself, never mind what I run on it.
That said, pis are a poor value proposition nowadays and there are better options for the same use case
What are the better options?
Pis have great software support so for GPIO experimentation it's so useful.
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Where are these cheap e waste laptops with gpio and actually low power?
Digging through e-waste bins is one of my hobbies.
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
I use old Mac Minis that were cycled out from a company and replaced. An e-waste laptop is still probably cheaper, but you can still find the older model Mac Minis fairly cheap too. I have 2 of them that sit vertically side-by-side in a small rack with my router stationed above them. They both run Elementary OS.
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Get them from where? I always read about these basically-free computers but have yet to see one
Sometimes you can find them on eBay.
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I use old Mac Minis that were cycled out from a company and replaced. An e-waste laptop is still probably cheaper, but you can still find the older model Mac Minis fairly cheap too. I have 2 of them that sit vertically side-by-side in a small rack with my router stationed above them. They both run Elementary OS.
Here too. Free 2012 Mac Mini that's been servering away for a couple of years already 24/7 on UPS power. Gets a deserved smile every time I look at it
I'm looking at replacing my 2018 desktop machine (a Thinkcentre Tiny) soon with one of the new AMD 395 mini-pcs. When that happens, the Mac Mini will be retired...
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
The only caveat here is the fire-hazard non-removable lithium batteries.
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Yeah, my pi sips energy very sparingly. Even an old laptop is going to be drawing more just to power itself, never mind what I run on it.
That said, pis are a poor value proposition nowadays and there are better options for the same use case
Oh absolutely, it really upsets me that they never dropped the prices down after covid supply issues were resolved. They were really proud of being accessible price-wise once upon a time ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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original post: https://mk.moth.zone/notes/a8zer7ypj6uv02ka
Low power and arm architecture are big differentiators between Pi and laptops.
I totally agree recycle laptops where possible, but they're generally noisier and less energy efficient plus the battery degrades over time and is a fire risk.
They're not necessairly a good fit for always-on server or service type uses comparef to a small board like Raspberry Pi. But a cheap or free second hand laptop is definitely good for tweaking, testing and trying our projects.
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The only caveat here is the fire-hazard non-removable lithium batteries.
Replacement is usually removing 6-10 screws and prying the case with a guitar pick or old credit card. There is most likely a disassembly video on youtube. Batteries from aliexpress or the like are usually cheap (although probably more expensive than the computer). Depending on the application, the "built-in UPS" can be nice.
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Facebook marketplace, kjiji, etc
Did someone fall asleep on the keyboard when they came up with kjiji?
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You lose the I/O and power efficiency is no comparison. You can get better power efficiency and sometimes some I/O with an old router and OpenWRT, but you'll be in the class of a Beagle Bone and a much harder learning curve. I've never managed to get a sensor or peripheral working on some old laptop's SPI or I2C buses like how easy it is on a Rπ.
You can get an esp32 or whatever and have io
