In 2014 I watched new single-board-computers enter the market. I am very fond of the Raspberry Pi project and I am using RPi for quite some time now as you can see from my previous posts on my website. Now I am curious about the differences. I am currently looking for a base station for my home automation project. I wouldn’t call this a server since this term is in most cases used for different hardware. In this context reliability, cost of operation running 24/7, ease of use are the most important factors for me. I am going to write a series of blog posts on benchmarks of the different models in this context.
The BeagleBone Black is a $45 ARM Cortex-A8 community-supported development platform. With 4GB of eMMC flash on-board, processor speed increase to 1GHz, and improved power consumption in comparison to earlier beaglebone boards – the BBB has much to offer. BBB has 512MB DDR3 ram. Unboxing the board and the enclosure both make a perfected impression on me. Assembly of the enclosure is very easy since the board is mounted using 4 little screws. The rock solid enclosure has openings that allow access to buttons and GPIO pins.
During the last two weeks I got convinced by the excellent quality of the BBB board and enclosure. I am particularity fond of the Beaglebone since it is open hardware (in the sense of open source hardware!).
After an initial little hiccup during installation of Debian Linux I decided to use Archlinux from now on.
Each Tuesday is BeagleBone Black Day here Adafruit! What is the BeagleBone? The BeagleBones are a line of affordable single-board Linux computers (SBCs) created by Texas Instruments. New to the Bone? Grab one of our Adafruit BeagleBone Black Starter Packs and check out our extensive resources available on the Adafruit Learning System including a guide to setting up the Adafruit BeagleBone IO Python Library. We have a number of Bone accessories including add-on shields (called “capes”) and USB devices to help you do even more with your SBC. Need a nice display to go along with your Bone? Check out our fine selection of HDMI displays, we’ve tested all of them with the Beagle Bone Black!
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Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.