this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2023
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Banana Pi BPI-M7 - More Reasons to Avoid the Raspberry Pi (www.cnx-software.com)
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by TCB13@lemmy.world to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
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The Banana Pi BPI-M7 single board computer is equipped with up to 32GB RAM and 128GB eMMC flash, and features an M.2 2280 socket for one NVMe SSD, three display interfaces (HDMI, USB-C, MIPI DSI), two camera connectors, dual 2.5GbE, WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2, a few USB ports, and a 40-pin GPIO header for expansion.

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[–] TCB13@lemmy.world 10 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

If you're looking for cheap... what would recommend is instead a Mini-PC like the HP EliteDesk 800 G2 DM or the Dell OptiPlex 3050 Micro.

For a small NAS and self-host a few services even an old laptop will do it, however there are advantages to picking a mini PC. Those machines are quiet, don’t require much power and some can even fit a 2.5" hard drive so you won’t need external hard drive enclosures. More on that later.

For eg. for 100€ you can find an HP Mini with an i5 8th gen + 16GB of ram + 256GB NVME that obviously has a case, a LOT of I/O, PCIe (m2) comes with a power adapter and outperforms a RPi5 in all possible ways. Note that the RPi5 8GB of ram will cost you 80€ + case + power adapter + cable + bullshit adapter + SD card + whatever else money grab - the Pi isn’t just a good option.

Aside from the big brands like HP and Dell there are other alternatives such as the trendy MINISFORUM however their BIOS comes out of the factory with weird bugs and the hardware isn’t as reliable - missing ESD protection on USB in some models and whatnot.

[–] PeachMan@lemmy.world 13 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

So it costs more up front, and it uses more electricity which costs more in the long term.

I don't need all the extra Pi accessories, I already have cables and chargers and SD cards. So for me, the price of a Pi is just the price of a Pi.

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)
  • HP Mini with an i5 8th gen = 35W
  • RPi 5 = 27W

Do you really think that will make a difference. For what's worth how much do you pay to have a 35W device running all year? In my case I'm paying a crazy 0,157€/kW... Amounts to 35/1000*24*365*0.157 = 48.14€/year considering a full load that the machine never has.

[–] ShortN0te@lemmy.ml 6 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The max Power consumption often does not matter on devices that run 24/7 more important is the idle powet consumption. Here are SBCs and ARM Chips in generell way better.

I had my Pi 3B+ down to under 5W on idle having various services running. I can not speek for newer Pi versions but i would estimate them still lower then 8W on idle. That is really hard to beat with an normal PC. Maybe the Mini PC with newer Mobile or integrated CPUs are getting in this region.

Not quite sure where you got the 37W for the HP Mini.

[–] PeachMan@lemmy.world 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Lmao did you just compare the highest possible power consumption on a Pi with the lowest possible consumption on a desktop PC?

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world -2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Lmao, do your research before commenting stuff like that.

TDP 35 W Thermal Design Power (TDP) represents the average power, in watts, the processor dissipates when operating at Base Frequency with all cores active under an Intel-defined, high-complexity workload. Refer to Datasheet for thermal solution requirements.

Here's how things look on the HP model above:

  Model name:            Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8500T CPU @ 2.10GHz
    BIOS Model name:     Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8500T CPU @ 2.10GHz To Be Filled By O.E.M. CPU @ 2.0GHz
    BIOS CPU family:     205
    CPU family:          6
    Model:               158
    Thread(s) per core:  1
    Core(s) per socket:  6
    Socket(s):           1
    Stepping:            10
    CPU(s) scaling MHz:  23%
    CPU max MHz:         3500.0000
    CPU min MHz:         800.0000

Obviously that thing wont be running at base frequency while idling. Here is one if units right now:

analyzing CPU 0:
  driver: intel_pstate
  CPUs which run at the same hardware frequency: 0
  CPUs which need to have their frequency coordinated by software: 0
  maximum transition latency: 4294.55 ms.
  hardware limits: 800 MHz - 3.50 GHz
  available cpufreq governors: performance, powersave
  current policy: frequency should be within 800 MHz and 3.50 GHz.
                  The governor "powersave" may decide which speed to use
                  within this range.
  current CPU frequency is 800 MHz.

See, it scales down to 800Mhz with a watt meter I remember it translated to idling at around 10-11W.

I never said it was better than a Pi, I just said the difference is not worth it and you're still ignoring the fact that i5-8500T will be able to do a LOT more work than the RPi5 could do while keeping the CPU bellow or at 2.1 GHz - not surpassing the 35 W TDP.

[–] PeachMan@lemmy.world 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Okay got it, so you compared the highest possible TDP on a Pi with the average/idle TDP on a desktop, and you're acting like that's a fair comparison. Thanks for clearing that up!

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world -2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

No... I compared the highest possible TDP on a Pi with with the average TDP of a "T-CPU" (power-optimized) running at full load and I concluded by saying a realistic idle consumption is 11W.

Look I'm sure the Pi does a lot better than 11W idle, but at those such low consumptions is is mostly irrelevant. I also added that given load X (equivalent to the Pi CPU at max load) the Intel CPU will make make it without reaching even the 35W while the Pi is going to be running at a full 27W.

[–] fox2263@lemmy.world 0 points 11 months ago

TDP != Power consumption.

[–] eclipse@lemmy.world 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Where on earth are you buying HP Mini machines for so cheap? Even the older gen seem to be 5 times as expensive as your estimate.

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

With patience and from eBay and local second hand websites. If you're in Europe you'll usually see sellers from Germany selling them for cheap, in the US there are a LOT more offers.

Regardless, like used cars, sometimes a specific generation that is cheap today can be more expensive tomorrow , it all depends on the amount of machines someone or some big company is dumping at the time you're searching for. In my case I can usually get things locally cheaper than eBay, for eg. recently I saw a very good deal on a HP Elite Mini 600 G9 i3-12100T 16GB of RAM, NMVe 256GB for 300€.

[–] eclipse@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

I appreciate the info, but I am not a patient man. :)

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago

Fair enough 😂

[–] deleted@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Thank you for your detailed suggestion.

I’ve got HP ProDesk 600 G5 Mini i5-9500T off ebay for $190. Best damn purchase ever. Running 21 docker containers and transcode 4k with ease while consuming only 35w.

However, sometimes you need GPIOs especially for school projects.

[–] TCB13@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

However, sometimes you need GPIOs especially for school projects.

Yes but think about this, for a simple school/electronics project you can get even an old RPi 2B+ for around 10$ nowadays that will get the job done. For a NAS / media center / selfhosting any second hand machine will be a better choice. I wouln't even mix the two into a single board.

There are also other brand new cheap SBCs that might work for your electronics such as the Radxa Zero 3W or the Zero 3E or even the Raspberry Pi Zero W. The point is that it doesn't make sense to buy a standard and expensive RPi for things that don't require much CPU. If you don't really need an OS and you code C or MicroPython a 3.5$ ESP32 board as well.