Without a doubt, the Raspberry Pi is one of the hottest single board computers on the market today. At the end of February, the Raspberry Pi Foundation unexpectedly released the new generation upgrade version – the Raspberry Pi 3. After a long month of waiting, we finally got our hands on the official production version of the Raspberry Pi 3. Adhering to the principle that good things should be shared, we are excited to share this with all netizens.

From the information we currently have, the Raspberry Pi comes in RS and Element14 versions, both having the same performance and functionality, only differing in the printed information and origin on the board. The version we received is the Element14 version of the Raspberry Pi 3, produced in the great PRC, as shown in the image below.

The packaging is simple, but holding it in your hands gives you an exhilarating feeling. The contents of the box include the Raspberry Pi 3 wrapped in an anti-static bag, a safety guide, and a quick start guide.

From the first impression of the Raspberry Pi 3, the appearance is almost identical to the Raspberry Pi 2, and the onboard resources are “basically the same”.

However, upon closer inspection, we can still see many changes in components and circuits. Comparing the Raspberry Pi 2, let’s take a look at the main changes.

Compared to the Raspberry Pi 2

Compared to the Raspberry Pi 2, the Raspberry Pi 3 has the following major changes:

• Comprehensive upgrade of the CPU, from 32-bit A7 (BCM2836) to 64-bit A53 (BCM2837), with the main frequency upgraded from 900MHz to 1.2GHz;

• The GPU core remains the same, but the main frequency has increased from 250MHz to 400MHz.

• WiFi/BLE circuits have been added to the back of the board, facilitating the development of smart products;

• The power supply circuit has been upgraded to 2.5A@5V, increasing the possibility of expanding more modules;

• The two indicator lights have also been moved to the power side due to the layout of the antenna;

In addition to these major changes, the Raspberry Pi 3 also has minor modifications, such as a more compact MicroSD card slot, which is no longer a push-button structure and allows for direct insertion and removal.

Power-On Testing

Currently, there isn’t much information available about the Raspberry Pi 3. Additionally, since it uses a Broadcom application processor, the information is hard to fully open source, making it difficult to visually describe the performance of this application processor. Let’s conduct a power-on test, and of course, we need a comparison object, which the Raspberry Pi 2 will undoubtedly fulfill, acting as the “green leaf”.

The system uses the latest official Raspbian Jessie, written onto a MicroSD card using the Win32DiskImager tool. After connecting the relevant monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc., and powering on, the familiar interface appears before your eyes.

Raspberry Pi 3 booting:

But what truly surprises you is that before you can even properly review the startup information, you have already entered the post-boot interface. The most profound feeling: one word – “fast”.

When checking the CPU information via command, a major issue was discovered: it displayed armv7 architecture. Shouldn’t the 64-bit A53 processor be armv8? The author speculates that this is due to the system’s kernel/firmware not being updated to ARMv8, with the CPU frequency displaying 600MHz~1.2GHz.

Next, we will test the main upgraded features of the Raspberry Pi 3, including CPU performance comparison tests with the Raspberry Pi 2, WiFi functionality tests, and Bluetooth functionality tests. For convenience, this test will only connect to Ethernet and power supply, controlling the Raspberry Pi via SSH for relevant command operations.

Performance Comparison Testing

The system selected for comparison testing is the latest version of the Raspbian system from the Raspberry Pi official website, with testing tools chosen as sysbench and memtester.

• Sysbench

Sysbench is an open-source multi-threaded performance testing tool that can test the CPU’s maximum performance to the fullest. The test involves calculating the time taken to find the largest prime number between 0 and 20000, with all four cores running.

During the test, if you touch the surface of the processor, you can clearly feel the rapid increase in temperature; all four cores running indeed make it quite hot (this gives you an idea of what it’s like for those 8-core or 10-core phones when playing large games or working under full load). If you need to work under four-core load for a long time, adding a cooling device would be a good idea.

Raspberry Pi 3 test results:

Raspberry Pi 2 test results:

The Raspberry Pi 3 completed the test in about 119 seconds, while the Raspberry Pi 2 took nearly 195 seconds, meaning the Raspberry Pi 2 took over a minute longer. Although the improvement is significant, it is not as shocking as the upgrade from the Raspberry Pi B+ to the Raspberry Pi 2. It is evident that the ARM Cortex-A7 is not too outdated, but the A53 performs even better.

• Memtester

Memtester is a memory stress testing tool originally used to test memory errors for a given memory. Here, the author added a timing function to check CPU performance by measuring the time taken for a given 256MB memory size.

Raspberry Pi 3 test results:

Raspberry Pi 2 test results:

The Raspberry Pi 3 only took 487 seconds, while the Raspberry Pi 2 took 1381 seconds. This gap is quite large; as far as the author understands, both the Raspberry Pi 2 and Raspberry Pi 3 have RAM operating at the same 400MHz frequency, but the Raspberry Pi 3 surprisingly leads by such a margin when testing with the same memory. This indeed is surprising; perhaps this is the advantage of a 64-bit processor.

WiFi Functionality Testing

Since the Raspberry Pi 2 does not have WiFi and Bluetooth functionality, the following tests can only be performed by the Raspberry Pi 3. Many users have long anticipated the onboard WiFi module since the earlier generations of the Raspberry Pi, and many have tried external USB WiFi modules. The WiFi network configuration for the Raspberry Pi 3 is basically no different from that of the external USB WiFi network configuration. You can configure your own wireless network by entering /etc/network/interfaces.

The author changed it to a static IP to prevent having to search for the IP address again when reconnecting via SSH.

After completing the configuration, reboot the Raspberry Pi, unplug the network cable, and reconnect via WiFi SSH to the Raspberry Pi 3. How refreshing is this feeling?

Bluetooth Functionality Testing

If you update the Raspberry Pi 3’s Raspbian system to the latest version, it comes with the corresponding Bluetooth firmware and some software, such as the bluetoothctl application. You can enter the command bluetoothctl to access the Bluetooth console and type help to see the relevant command instructions, as shown below.

Type power on to turn on Bluetooth, then enter scan on to search for nearby Bluetooth devices. The author placed an egg (Bluetooth controller) nearby, which was successfully searched and connected.

It was also successfully paired with the author’s Huawei phone.

If you find the command window operations cumbersome, you can also install the Bluetooth application blueman under the graphical system. The specific steps will not be detailed here; interested readers can try it themselves. The method of configuring Bluetooth is much simpler.

Conclusion

Overall, the experience with the Raspberry Pi 3 has been very satisfying. The performance has significantly improved, and the functionality has greatly enhanced, especially with the addition of the two hottest wireless communication methods: WiFi and Bluetooth. In today’s booming Internet of Things, smart hardware, and wearable devices, these two features have given the Raspberry Pi a timely boost, akin to a martial arts protagonist wielding the Dragon Slayer Sword and the Heavenly Sword, looking up to the sky and shouting, “The sky is high for birds to fly, and the sea is vast for fish to leap.” Although this article only experiences the performance and new features of the Raspberry Pi 3, many issues were also discovered during use, such as the CPU architecture still displaying armv7, occasional WiFi disconnections during SSH connections, and Bluetooth connection failures. We hope that subsequent version upgrades can quickly fix these small issues and greatly enhance user experience. We will continue to pay attention to various information and projects regarding the Raspberry Pi 3, as well as upcoming articles on the Raspberry Pi 3 equipped with the Windows 10 IoT system.

Thanks to: Aibanjia for sharing!

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