Aidis previously reported the development of a credit card sized computer, aimed at making an 'affordable to all' solution. Although the Raspberry Pi will not send a man to Mars (in fact it may struggle to send someone round the corner), the price tag of just over £21 will not break the bank.
Some of the headline features of the Raspberry Pi are:
- 256MB Ram
- HDMI socket - to connect to a monitor or TV
- USB socket - to connect a keyboard
- Ethernet socket - to connect to the Internet
- SD card slot - to act as the hard drive
- 3.5mm audio socket - for sound
The operating system is to be Linux based to help keep down the cost as well as not being as greedy on the Pi's specifications.
Currently there are 2 resellers of the Raspberry Pi, with stocks being imported from China where they are being made, but as of yet they have not reached our shores.
This pocket-sized computer will never run the latest video games to anywhere near their fullest, though could open up an affordable solution for those wishing to use less demanding tasks such as word processing.
As far as assistive technology is concerned, it's down to what assistive software and device drivers are available on Linux. This tends to be few and far between. Will this change in the future? Well I'm sure it'll be a case of supply and demand. If the demand is their then the supply will most likely follw and only time will tell.
The introduction of the Raspberry Pi has sparked a great deal of interest and initial reported sales are high. The Raspberry Pi may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it may also effect the overall pricing structure of computers in the future.
