The Raspberry Pi is an inexpensive credit card-sized micro-computer. The Raspberry Pi was originally designed as a way to teach how computers work and the rest of computer science in general. It was originally developed in the UK by a team that included Eben Upton, Rob Mullins, Jack Lang, and Alan Mycroft. They were pretty successful in achieving their initial goals and contributed to the evolution of computer science education in many schools. However, the Raspberry Pi could do more than just teach computer science. This tool also turned out to be very useful for the veteran developer community as well. Several people began using it and its popularity never dropped. To date, Raspberry Pi has been doing very well and comes out with new products quite often. They have even opened a physical store !! In this article, we will look into the evolution of this wonder device.
Timeline
The Raspberry Pi has been around for quite sometime now (for the past 8 years to be precise). Since then they have released 4 generations of our beloved Pi. Every stage of this evolution brought something new with it, be it Wi-Fi or bluetooth, the community has loved it all. Let’s now look at a timeline of the different versions of the Pi since its launch.
2019 – present
Raspberry Pi 4 B
(1GB, 2GB,4GB)
2018
Raspberry Pi 3
(A+, B+)
2017
Raspberry Pi Zero
(W/WH)
2016
Raspberry Pi 3
(B)
2015
Raspberry Pi Zero
2015
Raspberry Pi 2
(B)
2014
Raspberry Pi
(A+, B+)
2013
Raspberry Pi
(A)
2012
Raspberry Pi
(B)
Comparison
| Model | Dimensions |
Ethernet | WiFi |
GPIO pins |
Bluetooth | CPU | RAM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Raspberry Pi B | 85.60 × 56.5 mm | Yes |
No | 26 Pin |
No | 1× ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz | 512 MiB (shared with GPU) (newer versions) |
| Raspberry Pi A | 85.60 × 56.5 mm | No | No | 26 Pin |
No | 1× ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz | 256 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi B+ | 85.60 × 56.5 mm | Yes |
No | 40 Pin | No |
1× ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz | 512 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi A+ | 65 × 56.5 mm | No | No |
40 Pin | No |
1× ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz | 512 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi 2 B |
85.60 × 56.5 mm | Yes | No | 40 Pin | No | 4× Cortex-A7 900 MHz | 1 GiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi Zero | 65 × 30 mm |
No | No | 40 Pin | No |
ARMv6Z (32-bit) |
512 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi 3 B | 85.60 × 56.5 mm |
Yes | Yes | 40 Pin |
4.1 BLE | 4× Cortex-A53 1.2 GHz | 1 GiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi Zero (W/WH) | 65 × 30 mm | No | Yes | 40 Pin | 4.1 BLE |
1× ARM1176JZF-S 1 GHz |
512 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi 3 B+ | 85.60 × 56.5 mm |
Yes | Yes |
40 Pin | 4.2 LS BLE | 4× Cortex-A53 1.4 GHz | 1 GiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi 3 A+ | 65 × 56.5 mm | No | Yes |
40 Pin | 4.2 BLE | 4× Cortex-A53 1.4 GHz | 512 MiB (shared with GPU) |
| Raspberry Pi 4 B |
85.60 × 56.5 mm | Yes |
Yes |
40 Pin | 5.0 | 4× Cortex-A72 1.5 GHz |
1/2/4 GiB (shared with GPU) |
As you can see the choice is huge among the various types of Pis so you don’t necessarily need the newest and most advanced ones. Instead, it depends majorly on what you intend to use it for. You will have to weigh your uses against the specifications provided and see if they do or do not match your constraints.
