Raspberry Pi 2
- Thread starter HalfEatenPie
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- multicore raspberry pi
Well that was depressing. Even with the overclocking I tried using it for about 3 hours straight and be productive. Once I abandoned that idea I started to look for entertainment and that was just as bad. Chromium would crash and burn if I tried to stream anything so I decided to pull some files from my NAS to play locally because I tried streaming music from Grooveshark, but Chromium kept closing itself even if I tried to re-open it after it crashed so I switched to Midori for basic browsing which had noticeably increase loading times for websites I visit regularly. I finally got a media player installed that let me listen to music and it was a good experience, the audio quality through the HDMI cable was good and playback was smooth and responsive. I found out that the volume control in my taskbar was just for show. I gave up on video playback after having less luck getting a GUI installed. YouTube was horrible at all resolutions (240p stuttered on fullscreen). I was tempted to switch to wired internet, but 30Mbps should be enough for normal usage and the wireless connection was stable without any dropped connections so it had that going for it. My RDP experience was still just as good as before though so the RPi2 is still top of my list as a thin client.
I switched over to my C1 before heading to bed to see just how different the experience was after spending 3 hours with the RPi2 and it was unbelievably different. My first test was to go onto YouTube to run the same videos to see my experience (wired network vs wireless though) and that was like night and day. Watching the same video in fullscreen at 480p was smooth enough and watching at 720p windowed was even watchable. My TV is only 720p so I just grabbed a bunch of video formats from my NAS and the playback for all of them out of the box, without any adjustments or installing any software, was great. No hiccups, no distortion, and best of all it didn't max all of the CPUs so I could still multitask to an extent (running Kodi fullscreen with some HD test videos caused the mouse to lag but the video wasn't impacted and remained running smoothly). My NAS has a built in web GUI which supports audio and video streaming if you have Flash installed which I did so I started watching a video I could find on my NAS that streamed (MP4 worked nicely without VLC) and it played nicely. Couldn't get VLC player to work, but with all of the media players than came pre-installed I was fine with that. Audio playback was just as good as the RPi2 and the volume could be adjusted in Lubuntu so that's a plus there. Web browsing was perfect, no issues to speak of and no crashes when a site was overloaded with ads or images. I ended up overclocking the C1's CPU from 1.5GHz to 1.7GHz just for fun since I had bought the heatsink addon and the temps were on par with the OC'ed RPi2 without a heatsink according to the internal sensors. The one thing that annoys me to no end with the C1 is that damned micro HDMI port, I can't find a cable or adapter to fit in it that isn't flimsy as hell and causes the video to drop if you breath on it wrong whereas the RPi2 can be dropped from my desk multiple times (as I accidentally test multiple times every time I use it) and continue working normally without missing a beat. Lastly, I decided to RDP into my Win 7 VPS and the experience was the same as before, usable in a pinch but not as good as the RPi2.
It looks like the RPi2 will be better used as a headless box or as a thin client. It might make for a good HTPC but the C1 would work better.
I switched over to my C1 before heading to bed to see just how different the experience was after spending 3 hours with the RPi2 and it was unbelievably different. My first test was to go onto YouTube to run the same videos to see my experience (wired network vs wireless though) and that was like night and day. Watching the same video in fullscreen at 480p was smooth enough and watching at 720p windowed was even watchable. My TV is only 720p so I just grabbed a bunch of video formats from my NAS and the playback for all of them out of the box, without any adjustments or installing any software, was great. No hiccups, no distortion, and best of all it didn't max all of the CPUs so I could still multitask to an extent (running Kodi fullscreen with some HD test videos caused the mouse to lag but the video wasn't impacted and remained running smoothly). My NAS has a built in web GUI which supports audio and video streaming if you have Flash installed which I did so I started watching a video I could find on my NAS that streamed (MP4 worked nicely without VLC) and it played nicely. Couldn't get VLC player to work, but with all of the media players than came pre-installed I was fine with that. Audio playback was just as good as the RPi2 and the volume could be adjusted in Lubuntu so that's a plus there. Web browsing was perfect, no issues to speak of and no crashes when a site was overloaded with ads or images. I ended up overclocking the C1's CPU from 1.5GHz to 1.7GHz just for fun since I had bought the heatsink addon and the temps were on par with the OC'ed RPi2 without a heatsink according to the internal sensors. The one thing that annoys me to no end with the C1 is that damned micro HDMI port, I can't find a cable or adapter to fit in it that isn't flimsy as hell and causes the video to drop if you breath on it wrong whereas the RPi2 can be dropped from my desk multiple times (as I accidentally test multiple times every time I use it) and continue working normally without missing a beat. Lastly, I decided to RDP into my Win 7 VPS and the experience was the same as before, usable in a pinch but not as good as the RPi2.
It looks like the RPi2 will be better used as a headless box or as a thin client. It might make for a good HTPC but the C1 would work better.
TheLinuxBug
New Member
@KuJoe Just a thought, I think the volume control in Raspbian by default controls the regular audio port on the RPi and not the HDMI output. This is likely why you saw no effect on volume while playing back through HDMI. I haven't played with it enough to see if you can change the settings for the volume control, but it may be that you just have to chose the output device it is controlling. All the sudden I am having this thought that maybe there is also a setting for this in the Raspbian configuration utility, but I can't remember at the moment. Will have to go boot my B+ and look.
Cheers!
Cheers!
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raj
Active Member
That's an excellent real world comparison that I've been searching for. I own a RPi1B+ and a C1. I was thinking of picking up an RPi2 or C1 (or XU3-lite if I can convince myself the HMP would make major a difference in my daily work), but I was curious as to the performance difference for desktop replacement usage between the two. You may have sealed the deal for me!
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Glad I could help. I'm definitely grabbing at least one more C1s as a personal computer for my daughter. I'll probably stick with RPi2's for other projects that don't require a GUI or a fast network connection though because the power usage is less and the WiFi works flawlessly compared to the C1... plus I prefer Debian over Ubuntu so that makes it easier also.
TheLinuxBug
New Member
My RPi2 arrives today in the mail via USPS! Super excited to give the new Pi a test spin... now to wait impatiently for the mail man to arrive with my package. *props eyes open with toothpicks*
Cheers!
Cheers!
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drmike
100% Tier-1 Gogent
Is someone offering Pi colo in UK officially?
souen
Active Member
Don't know if it's official (as it's not advertised on their site), but @MSPNick is currently doing it in the UK.
Id be interested to see how these are racked, ive always toyed with the idea of racking a few myself! - it would be fantastic if you could pxe boot them and you could make a micro usb remote pdu.
TheLinuxBug
New Member
And of course the beautiful weather here made it impossible for USPS to deliver mail today 
. So it looks like my RPi2 won't be here until Monday now. I was so looking forward to spending the evening testing it, guess I will just have to find something else to occupy my time tonight.
Cheers!
. So it looks like my RPi2 won't be here until Monday now. I was so looking forward to spending the evening testing it, guess I will just have to find something else to occupy my time tonight.Cheers!
It could be worse, UPS delivered one of our new SSD nodes to the wrong address last Tuesday and the company is apparently so big they haven't been able to find our server.And of course the beautiful weather here made it impossible for USPS to deliver mail today
Cheers!
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Not for now. The 2EUR/month Kidecherie killed the Raspberry Pi market, it's not worth it to invest in new Pis. Also waiting for online.net to announce the prices for their ARM based servers.If @rds100 starts renting out RPi2s I'll probably upgrade my RPi Model B+ I have with him now. *Hint hint!*
drmike
100% Tier-1 Gogent
For what it is worth, I still believe there is a market, regardless of price competition from Online or anyone else. Especially where geographic location is not identical.
I would buy a Pi where someone would bundle a bigger drive with it and especially where new board was offered (quad core).
What do you mean by "bigger drive"? USB mechanical drives suck big time, usually the manufacturers put the lowest quality HDDs inside, those that can't pass the quality testing and cannot be sold as standalone SATA HDDs. And the Raspberry Pi doesn't have a SATA port so it is limited to using USB storage.
I'd rather offer an Atom server with big SATA HDD than a Raspberry with big USB HDD.
I'd rather offer an Atom server with big SATA HDD than a Raspberry with big USB HDD.
drmike
100% Tier-1 Gogent
Well the cheapest option would be USB attached whatever. Other option would be USB flash (meh)... Then there would be network attached storage (not really possible / pleasant on older models - but maybe with new).
Clearly the lack of eSATA or SATA or other real interface is a shortcoming in the Pi design / limiting.
Nonetheless, I'd buy one.
Clearly the lack of eSATA or SATA or other real interface is a shortcoming in the Pi design / limiting.
Nonetheless, I'd buy one.
Exactly.
I am still paying for one of yours @rds100
And also, I have one of that kidechire stuff, but I guess they don't have any stock actually, and probably won't have in some time.
drmike
100% Tier-1 Gogent
Checked logs after repowering it? Is it in case? Perhaps thermal issue? I've had same happen with a bad USB power converter. Tossed that one aside.