These Raspberry Pi alternatives should soon be easier to find

Date:
Sat, 27 Aug 2022 11:01:31 +0000

Description:
Online store OKdo has struck a new deal that should make accessing Raspberry Pi alternatives easier.

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If you're a Raspberry Pi aficionado looking for alternatives to the sought-after microcomputer, you might be pleased to know that
Rockchip-powered boards will now be available from the UK-based online store OKdo.

Rockchip, a manufacturer based in Fuzhou, China produces popular Raspberry Pi alternatives under the "Rock" brand name, such as the Rock Pi 4.

The announcement, revealed via eeNews Europe , comes as the longstanding relationship between RS Group, owner of OKdo, and the Raspberry Pi Foundation lapsed after almost a decade. What does this mean?

OKdo says the move will boost the availability of customizable single-board (CSB) computers as a result of its engineering expertise, technology, ecosystem partners, supply chain and global distribution channels.

The range of products includes the ROCK 4 SE, a cost-reduced version of
Radxas ROCK 4C Plus board that uses the RK3399-T six-core ARM processor.

The motherboard boasts two Cortex-A72 cores with a performance capacity of 1.5GHz and four 1.0GHz Cortex-A53 cores, as well as ARMs T860MP4 Mali GPU
with 4GB of 64bit LPDDR4 RAM.

Today's news could be music to the ears of hardware tinkerers or those simply interested in upskilling their python development , as Raspberry PI has suffered some serious shortages in the past year.

In an interview with The Verge , the boss of the trading arm of Raspberry Pi foundation Eben Upton described the shortages as "very bad".

He added: "We sold the same number of Raspberry Pis last year that we sold
the year before, but we entered last year with about a half-million unit customer backlog, and we left last year with several million units of
customer backlog." Read more

Raspberry Pi devices just got a basic upgrade that should have happened

ages ago

Raspberry Pi can now detect malware without any software

Our list of the best laptops for developers

Richard Curtin, Co-Founder and CTO of OKdo, believes Raxa, a Rockchip design partner, is particularly well suited to weathering the storm of the supply chain crisis.

Curtin said: "Considering the supply chain constraints that Taiwan Semiconductors have had lately, there is a significant risk of stock
shortages when the production of semiconductors is solely located in Asia or in one wafer fab."

He added that Rockchip's use of several different types of wafers "was one of the main attraction points when we initiated the design, manufacture, and distribution partnership with Radxa". Want put your hardware to good use? Checkout our guide to best python courses



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/these-raspberry-pi-alternatives-should-soon-be- easier-to-find/


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