this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2023
20 points (55.2% liked)

Selfhosted

40407 readers
204 users here now

A place to share alternatives to popular online services that can be self-hosted without giving up privacy or locking you into a service you don't control.

Rules:

  1. Be civil: we're here to support and learn from one another. Insults won't be tolerated. Flame wars are frowned upon.

  2. No spam posting.

  3. Posts have to be centered around self-hosting. There are other communities for discussing hardware or home computing. If it's not obvious why your post topic revolves around selfhosting, please include details to make it clear.

  4. Don't duplicate the full text of your blog or github here. Just post the link for folks to click.

  5. Submission headline should match the article title (don’t cherry-pick information from the title to fit your agenda).

  6. No trolling.

Resources:

Any issues on the community? Report it using the report flag.

Questions? DM the mods!

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

There are a lot of reasons not to give them your money. They're assholes to the maker community and they openly talk shit on a lot of their customer base. That's beside the point, though, really.

It's just not a spectacular option for hosting. In order to get a Rpi competitive with even the shittiest laptop from 7 years ago, you're going to end up spending more than you would spend on a decent laptop from 7 years ago.

If it is a computer that turns on, it will likely function orders of magnitude better than an Rpi and won't bind you to ARM architecture. My entire hosting setup was pulled out of a recycling pile for free. Install ubuntu/ubuntu server and enjoy yourself.

If you intend on spending any amount of money on this hobby, I cannot express enough how much I recommend against any of that money going toward a Raspberry Pi.

EDIT: A lot of you seem to be reading this as "Raspberry Pis are all nonfunctional" and getting mad about it. Don't do that.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] brian 31 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Can you expand on some of this?

I haven't really heard much regarding them being bad to their community/customer base, though I haven't bought in a few years.

In regards to cost/performance, what are you meaning you'd need to spend extra on to match that of an old laptop or recycled machine?

[–] talentedkiwi 20 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Not OP, but my Lenovo tiny computer on ebay is about $60 and will run circles around a raspberry pi

Power usage isn't too much higher, it's upgradeable, and it's x86-64 architecture so more things are supported.

My tiny has an i7 and was a bit more expensive, but it's a powerful little guy. I added more ram for a total of 32, and it does better than my "old" server (technically from same era).

Can't speak for the other stuff.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Do you run Windows on yours, or have you installed a different OS to run things?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Not op but I have 3 tiny PCs and I run Linux on them. But then I don't run windows at all because it honestly sucks.

[–] talentedkiwi 1 points 1 year ago

I run proxmox on bare metal. I have a couple VMs for docker, and video game servers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

facts, at this point you are paying for size, gpio and the fact that its a form factor with industrial grade options easily available. not really as useful for a hobbyist at the price though.

[–] talentedkiwi 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

For projects I prefer an ESP32 unless it needs a fancy GUI.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Any ESP32 you would recommend with easy wired networking (like DHCP client), easy language (python, node, c#. Tbh these are just the ones I know), easy IDE, and a bunch of libraries (like OSC, WebSockets, mqtt, rabbitmq, as well as stuff for various GPIO stuff)?

I've gone down a street of node-red on a raspberry pi, and I find it really easy to make complex things.
But 90% of my stuff is node->JS function->node. And I feel like I could do better!

[–] talentedkiwi 1 points 1 year ago

I haven't found one with wired (haven't looked through either), mine are all wireless. I played with visual studio code as a IDE, and it worked pretty well. You can also use the Arduino IDE, but it's been forever since I've used that. I'm about to dip my toes into ESPHome and combine with my home assistant.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Same with the HP elite desks, and don't forget you can get off lease Chromebooks with much better specs than pi for ~$60 as well

[–] afa 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

if you don’t want to be replacing sd cards

The truth hurts, but this is the truth. Clawing at those little shits is the most annoying thing ever.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I've heard log2ram can make the SD cards last much longer, I usually just make it read only though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

If you don't want to be replacing sdcards every two weeks, you'll need to add a hard drive with an enclosure which will also need power. You'll also need an upgraded power supply for the pi. To deal with any sort of scale, you'll need more than one in a swarm. If you don't want them just out in the open air, you'll either need to coat them or put them in cases. It just all adds up to way more than a $5 ebay laptop with a broken screen that has 20x the performance.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Don't buy garage SD cards. I have cards that have been in use for years.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago

Dang I gotta stop getting my cards from garages?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

I have an SSD connected to mine which doesn't need external power and runs fine off the "official" power adapter. The case I have isn't the greatest (two pieces of acrylic and some stand-offs lol), but it costed 50p and gets the job done.

As for scale, you're beyond a Pi at that point.