Raspberry Pi vs BeagleBone Black

Raspberry Pi and BeagleBone Black are both low-cost, credit card-sized microprocessor available on the market for students or new programming learners to start their own personal projects. How should we choose between these two microprocessors? What feature should we consider? I will discuss below.

About the Raspberry Pi

Raspberry Pi was the first low-cost single-board computers developed in the United Kingdom by the Raspberry Pi Foundation to promote basic computer science in schools and developing conuntries.

Image: http://www.adafruit.com/includes/templates/adafruit2013/images/pi_logo.png

Image: http://www4.pcmag.com/media/images/351321-raspberry-pi.jpg?thumb=y

Pros:

1. Lower cost (US$35)

2. More ports for connecting other devices such as 2 USB hosts, RPi camera connector, 3.5mm stereo jack

3. Lower power consumption (150-350mA @5V)

4. Better graphical resolution (1080p)

5. Higher popularity (13 times more web traffic by Google Trends)

Cons:

1. Lower specification (slower Processor, no on-board storage, only 8 GPIO pins for electronic components)

2. Hard to set up (it does not come with power supply and pre-installed operating system.)

About the BeagleBone Black

BeagleBone Black is a low-power open-source hardware single-board computer produced by Texas Instruments. The board was developed as an educational board that could be used in colleges around the world to teach open source hardware and software capabilities.

Image: https://www.adafruit.com/images/1200x900/674-00.jpg

Image: http://www.robofun.ro/image/data/produse/123343/BBB_Key_Comp.jpg

Pros:

1. Higher specification (faster processor, on-board storage, 65 GPIO pins)

2. Easy to set up (it comes with mini-USB cable for power supply, built-in operating system)

3. Open source (layout files, schematics, and reference documents)

Cons:

1. A bit more expensive (US$45)

2. Higher power consumption (210-460A @5V)

When to choose Raspberry Pi?

1. Multimedia based projects - Since Raspberry Pi has more powerful graphics processing and larger number of connection options, Raspberry Pi is an ideal choice.

2. Community driven Ideas – Raspberry Pi has a longer history than BeagleBone Black, the community of Raspberry Pi is more active and supportive for new users.

3. Computer-Science related projects – Raspberry Pi has 2 USB ports which can connect to both mouse and keyboard, and HDMI which can connect to monitor. It provides a more user-friendly interface for computer related teaching or projects because it is just like a computer.

When to choose BeagleBone Black?

1. Projects with many external sensors – BeagleBone Black has way more number of pins than Raspberry Pi for connecting different sensors which is a better choice for mechanical projects.

2. Commercialized projects – Since the BeagleBone Black would allow you to take the most important features of the board and directly port that into your own design, it does not require documentation or agreement with Texas Instruments. But Raspberry Pi does.

Other users' comments:

"Despite its HDMI connectivity, the BeagleBone Black isn’t a multimedia heavyweight like the Pi. Its impressively powerful processor and incredible array of general purpose input-output (GPIO) capabilities combined with clever pre-loaded software make it an excellent way to get started with embedded programming, however, while offering broader out-of-box capabilities than those of the Pi." by Gareth Halfacree

"No, the Pi isn’t going to be everyone’s idea of fun. You can lose hours of your day just trying to accomplish the smallest task on a computer that is far slower than even the cheapest Windows PC. But for the adventurous—and patient—that time spent losing yourself in critical thinking and learning how those easy-to-use computers around us work can be incredibly satisfying. And hey, it’s only $35—and unlike a real raspberry pie, it has no carbs."

by Joanna Stern

Image: http://i.imgur.com/IXsA81J.png (Left), http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/news_uploads/meteor-wall.jpg (Right)

For a mechanical engineer student, I am taking a class which project is powered by BeagleBone Black for connecting more sensors. The image above on the left is the class project, Mobile Inverted Pendulum (MiP) for MAE 143C. For my computer science friends, they use Raspberry Pi instead for software programming. The image above on the right is that researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at the University of California, San Diego, have built a Linux cluster using 16 Raspberry Picomputers as part of a program to teach children and adults the basics of parallel computing using a simple model. Depending on what kind of project you are going to work on, Raspberry Pi and BeagleBone Black are both good choice for personal projects. Since Raspberry Pi has its roots in education, BeagleBone fits more for engineering projects to have more possibilities and extensibilities.