[Mashiro]

I voted for "Other (Mention It)" and I would like to explain why.

My favorite SBC is actually also the Raspberry Pi SBC family. I have a Raspberry Pi 1 B, Raspberry Pi 1 B+, Raspberry Pi 3 B and recently got a Raspberry Pi 3 B+. I already fell in love with the Raspberry Pi SBC when it was announced. My Raspberry Pi 1 B is from one of the first revisions ever. It even has the little power delivery issues to the USB ports that were common in the first revisions and later got fixed but I didn't bother to get a new revision. Using it as a headless server with ethernet connection means the power delivery issue on the USB ports was absolutely no problem.

The 1 B+ was the second Pi I got and I bought it for my parents at that time to build them a Kodi media center. It worked well actually but at some point the performance wasn't enough. Somehow I just skipped Raspberry Pi 2 totally. Next big thing was the Pi 3 B which also initially was for my parents to provide them a much better media center. They're not tech savy at all. So I set it up for them as easy as possible in hopes that I wouldn't be getting bothered with issues. It works well.

When news hit the fan that 3 B+ was coming with CPU improvements, 5 GHz WiFi, PoE and the other goodies I first didn't plan to get one. A few months later I changed my mind though and bought one. I used it as a Plex Media Server first but unfortunately even with the strongest CPU so far in the Pi family it isn't able to do any encoding. Direct stream worked nicely with the newer and much faster ethernet connection.

Right now the 3 B+ is my retro gaming console. I got one of these cases (Nespi Case+ with working safe shutdown and restart buttons):




Added a small fan into it for better cooling than just the passive cooling elements on the components. Bought a SNES controller and started to game thanks to the RetroPie distribution. ROMs are widely available and it was a blast from the past to play Super Mario, Donkey Kong, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Bomberman and all the other classic games I was playing on a real SNES when I was a small kid.


Now to why I actually voted for other:
- Multiple selections while voting were not available or else I would have selected Raspberry Pi and Other.
- I actually have another SBC that is a lot better than the Raspberry Pi family while also being more expensive but totally worth it.

I have a 1st generation LattePanda SBC. A LattePanda is a SBC with a x86 Intel CPU. My 1st generation revision is one of the last and latest with an Intel Atom x5-Z8350 CPU, 4 GB RAM and 64 GB onboard eMMC flash. It also has ethernet, USB and also USB 3.0. In addition to the x86 CPU it actually has an integrated Arduino CPU on it which can be fully used for projects. GPIO pins are of course also available like on other SBCs. WiFi and BT are also onboard. A µSD reader is also available.

The greatest about the LattePanda is the x86 CPU allowing to run even Windows on it. It came with a Windows 10 Home copy on it which I replaced with Windows 10 Education to have more control over updates and etc. Meanwhile the developers behind LattePanda already have a second generation coming. The second generations will have more modern and much better specifications. We're talking about latest Intel Celeron and even Intel Core M3 CPUs, DDR3/DDR4 RAM and other goodies.

So if I had to compare I would say the LattePanda is my most favorite SBC with the Raspberry Pi being the second favorite alternative solution.

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Oh and I have two Youtube channels I would like to share with SBC fans.


ExplainingComputers: https://www.youtube.com/user/explainingcomputers/videos

At ExplainingComputers you can see a lot of different SBCs being covered with Raspberry Pi of course being one of the most favorite and receiving the most attention.


ETAPrime: https://www.youtube.com/user/Mretaprime/videos

ETAPrime is more for those who want to have fun with SBCs in terms of gaming and such.

He does things like overclocking, covering cases and other stuff related to SBCs. Can it run Crysis and similar. All that crazy stuff and also lovely emulation projects on SBCs to play SNES/NES, PS1 and other games on them and how they perform.