Raspberry Pi - Hardware Flaws and Fixups?

I know it has probably been mentioned before, but would it be that difficult (or expensive) to increase the on board memory, which apparently is shared with the GPU anyway, up to 512 Mb.?

This would enable certain Linux distros to run more 'smoothly' and should increase performance generally... shouldn't it?

I am by no means a hardware 'expert', so if this a silly rerquest. then I will apologise now!

It's a very reasonable question. The answer that's been given before was that the price of the 512M memory modules is much higher and it couldn't be done for the required price.  My guess is that if memory prices fall a future version could have more memory. I think the limit is1G because of the number of pins available.

All this is unofficial but based on what's been said before.

Chris/David

I have said before that it was not in our roadmap - but I hesitate things can always be changed  - I don't want to be in the situation where I say there is no interest or call for something when it is clearly not true.  So a measurement is in order.  I'll kick off a poll soon.

Our original (and still current) aim was to make the cheapest functional device to do the target educational job.  Given the tremendous support we have been given from so many different quarters we will re-evaluate it.  Price is an issue but interestingly bringing the model A up to 256Mb worked to increased volume of a single device and the price impact was minimal on A and positive on B.

Being absolutely honest my (not the foundation) concern is that providing a 512Mb device will mean that application developers will be tempted (not unreasonably) to use it and then not be able to support the 256Mb educational device - we are almost setting ourselves up for potential incompatibility issues. It's a concern not a fact - I'm and engineer and perhaps I'm plain wrong - comments?

Pete

My opinion is that the Pi board created this magnificent niche purely as a result of its low price, so you're totally right to focus on cost in my estimation.  After all, there is no shortage of higher-priced boards, but they never created this degree of interest.  $25 is a sort of magic threshold.  (The $35 model B is actually riding the wave created by the model A's magic price.)

Personally I'd not worry about RAM size incompatibility, for four reasons:

• Educational use rarely requires large amounts of memory, and education is after all the primary target.
• The Unix model works well with very little memory, and encourages the use of multiple small processes.
• Darwin will ensure that large monolithic programs that don't run in 256MB are discouraged. :-)
• Technical progress will inevitably mean that memory size will increase, so size variation is inescapable.

In summary, I suggest to always provide as much memory as current technology allows whenever a new iteration of the board is being designed, but always respecting the existing cost constraint.

Morgaine.

Thanks for your interesting reply Pete.

As it is so easy to do, what with all the 'hype' surrounding this device, I had forgotten for a moment its primary purpose which is, as you say, as an 'educational device'.

So far as the 'home user', 'enthusiast' or 'geek' (call them what you will) is concerned... and I include myself in one of those categories, I am sure they would welcome the involvement of more application developers, and hopefully the appearance of some more dedicated OS's also.

The idea of a cheap, but functional, 'mini Linux box' is very appealing, (especially when enclosed in a smart case!) although obviously ARM support is essential here, and of course the Foundation have their own pre-determined path to follow.

It would however be a very attractive option I feel, and one which would probably increase sales also... although perhaps not all in the intended market.

Definite food for thought... and for much further discussion I expect!

Thanks for your interesting reply Pete.

As it is so easy to do, what with all the 'hype' surrounding this device, I had forgotten for a moment its primary purpose which is, as you say, as an 'educational device'.

So far as the 'home user', 'enthusiast' or 'geek' (call them what you will) is concerned... and I include myself in one of those categories, I am sure they would welcome the involvement of more application developers, and hopefully the appearance of some more dedicated OS's also.

The idea of a cheap, but functional, 'mini Linux box' is very appealing, (especially when enclosed in a smart case!) although obviously ARM support is essential here, and of course the Foundation have their own pre-determined path to follow.

It would however be a very attractive option I feel, and one which would probably increase sales also... although perhaps not all in the intended market.

Definite food for thought... and for much further discussion I expect!