For a few years I used a Raspberry Pi 4 (RPi) as a Pi-hole and Wireguard server on my home network. An RPi 4 is overpowered for that sort of thing, but I had it, so I figured I might as well use it.
Over the last few weeks I noticed increasing problems with it. The best I can tell is that the RPi Micro SD card reading/writing hardware was somehow broken. The Micro SD card I had in it originally proved bad when I tried imaging it with a fresh OS install. A different card could successfully be imaged, but when I booted the RPi from it, some programs wouldn't run because they were corrupt.
I thought about buying a replacement RPi, but because of the RAMpocalypse, prices have gone through the roof. An equivalent new RPi 4 would cost $55, when I'm sure I purchased the original one for much less than that. With shipping it was looking like a $70-80 purchase, which seemed ridiculous.
In the end, I decided to simply run the Pi-hole and Wireguard services as Docker containers on the Mac Mini M4 I use as a media center. I leave the Mac Mini running all the time anyway, it uses only 4 Watts at idle, and it's more than capable of running these services.
Looking at pricing of new RPis, including the newest RPi 5, it got me thinking about the value proposition of the RPi 5 at the moment. The RPi was developed to be a low-cost, versatile single-board computer with many applications. All RPis can be used for various general and specialty computing projects, see the wide variety of RPi HATs available. However, with the newest RPi 5, they are trying to make the argument that it's becoming a general purpose computer for everyday use. They even highlight that the RPi 5 can drive dual 4K monitors at 60 Hz, not something I would associate with cheap computing.
Let's look at this complete RPi 5 kit. It comes with all you need to get up and running, minus a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. A 256GB SSD kit with 8GB of RAM costs $320. The kit includes active cooling, which is required to achieve maximum performance. A base RPi 5 with 8Gb of RAM costs $175, which means the rest of the kit costs $145.
Let's compare this to a base Mac Mini M6. This comes with 256 GB of SSD storage and 16GB of RAM for $899. Like the RPi kit, it comes with everything you need save a monitor, keyboard, and mouse.
Using a $305 RPi 5 with 16GB of RAM to match the Mini (making the RPi kit $305 + $145 = $450), below I compare the speeds of these computers. I'm using this Mac Mini M6 benchmark and this RPi 5 benchmark.
| Product | Single Core | Multicore | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| RPi 5 | 878 | 2,089 | $450 |
| Mini M6 | 4,661 | 20,525 | $899 |
| M6/RPi 5 | 5.3 | 9.8 | 2 |
We can see that the Mac Mini is over 5x faster in single core, and almost 10x faster in multicore, while the Mini costs only 2x more. That is a devastating price to performance ratio for the RPi. But wait!, you say, you can still buy two RPis for one Mini, which if you're on a limited budget (say, in a school), it really helps. But wait!, I respond, you still need to buy monitors, keyboards, and mice, which cost the same regardless if they're connected to a Mini or a RPi. The price savings with RPis isn't as big as you might think.
The true value proposition of an RPis are the GPIO pins which enables tons of fun and interesting computing projects. My solar water heater uses a RPi 3B+ and its GPIO pins to collect data and act as the thermostat. The tough spot that the RAMpocalypse has put RPi 5s is that this value proposition has been overtaken by component pricing, making the RPi 5 a poor choice for a general purpose computer. There might be situations where a faster RPi is needed when using the GPIO pins, but that's getting potentially niche. I would guess that most things you would need an RPi for could be done with one of the older and less expensive models.
Perhaps once the RAMpocalypse has passed the RPi 5 will again become an economical choice for hobby computing, but sadly, it isn't right now.