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The 16GB Raspberry Pi 5 got another ‘unavoidable’ RAM price hike (www.theverge.com)
submitted 4 days ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 148 points 4 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (36 children)

The aim of those buying up all the RAM is to prevent people owning devices capable of serious computing, so we have to rent what we used to have back from them, with added censorship and surveillance. Sam Altman has been explicit about how he wants no one to own RAM except companies running data centres. The Raspberry Pi becoming unfeasibly expensive is just an example of that forced transition from owning to renting playing out. When it was introduced the Pi cost $15 $35. We're in a different world now.

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  • [–] 100 points 4 days ago* (15 children)

    When it was introduced the Pi cost $15

    It was a 700MHz single core board with 512mb of ram...and it was $35, not $15

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  • [–] 24 points 4 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (11 children)

    And if tech had been proceeding since then as it did for the previous 30 years, you'd expect a whole lot more power for your $15 $35 now.

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  • [–] 26 points 4 days ago (5 children)

    An ESP32-P4 is about the same ram, better IO options, but half the CPU of the original Pi for about $20 right now. So the tech has been progressing a little bit.

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  • [–] 8 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    It's also been 14 years. "About the same ram...but half the CPU" for over half the price (original comment was wrong, it was $35, not $15) is not a flex. It's a stunning failure.

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  • [–] 14 points 4 days ago* (2 children)

    It was also $35 at release, not $15

    You're roughly getting 150x the power for 10x the cost with the current price hike.

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  • [–] 12 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    You're roughly getting 150x the power for 10x the cost with the current price hike.

    Maybe in a vacuum, but in a world with millions or even billions of 'legacy' devices sitting around collecting dust that have equal or better compute power for less cost, these devices don't really make sense.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    Moore’s law ran for 40 years but hit a wall around 2010 due to physics.

    “Free” upgrades ended long before AI bros started buying up all the RAM and GPUs.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 day ago

    It slowed around 2010 while Intel sat on its arse for quite a few years, but then transistors started shrinking again. This page has a chart suggesting the law has pretty much continued to hold. But we know that can't continue because things really are starting to hit physical limits now.

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