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Why is it called “Raspberry Pi”?
In a sense, the name “Raspberry” is quite simple, as many people were using various fruits to name computers and companies at that time.Among the many “fruits”, the most famous is the “Apple”.However, there are also names like Apricot and Acorn.Acorn was the company that made the BBC Micro, and this computer was one of the reasons that inspired co-founder and CEO Eben Upton to develop the Raspberry Pi.In addition, Upton also mentioned that the name is a fun reference to the phrase “blowing a raspberry” (which means making a sound that is mocking).As for “Pi”, isn’t your first reaction the number 3.14159265358979323846……That’s right, the Pi in the name pays homage to the magical irrational number “π” and also represents the programming language “Python” used for development.Of course, “Raspberry Pi” can also be understood as a pun on “Raspberry Pie”, so naturally, it also has the delicious “Raspberry Pie” connotation.
The Life of Pi
In fact, the history of Raspberry Pi began in 2006.At that time, the tech world was vastly different from today; Google had just become popular, Facebook was still a novelty, and Twitter had just been born.Everything about the Raspberry Pi began with a young engineer at Broadcom.In May 2011, the Raspberry Pi team first showcased a prototype.On July 24, 2011, the Raspberry Pi community opened and published the first official blog post.In November and December 2011, the Raspberry Pi prototype underwent two major design changes and was finalized.In 2011, some alpha and beta versions that would eventually become the first Raspberry Pi board were released to a closed user group.
In January 2012, the first Raspberry Pi board—Model B (yes, Model B was released before Model A)—was revealed, but only 10 boards were sold on eBay.On February 29, 2012, Model B began public sales.A British tech enthusiast recalled that he was waiting to place an order online at 6 AM that day. And it seemed he was not alone, as the two online stores selling the Raspberry Pi quickly crashed due to overload.In March 2012, the Raspberry Pi team announced that a batch of faulty products sent by the Chinese factory had extra parts that did not meet design specifications, which might affect the shipping of initial orders.By the end of March 2012, the Raspberry Pi team announced that qualified replacements had been sent by the Chinese factory, and the initial order shortfall was addressed.“We realized from the beginning that the market response would be greater than we expected,” Upton said. “Our initial idea was to produce about 1000 or 10000 units… We ordered several thousand from the first contract manufacturer in China.”“Before Christmas 2011, when we received the first batch of beta products, we put a Debian-based operating system online… It was downloaded 50,000 times immediately, and all the downloaders could do was run it in a QEMU emulator (which has a configuration similar to the Raspberry Pi).”“50,000 people downloaded this very primitive operating system for a machine they couldn’t buy!” Upton exclaimed.At that time, the founding team realized that the demand for Raspberry Pi would far exceed 1000, 10000, or even 100000 units.In May 2012, the first Raspberry Pi with a camera module was successfully developed.The world’s first photo taken by Raspberry Pi, captured by a developer during testingIn September 2012, Raspberry Pi production was transferred to the Sony facility in the UK.In May and September 2012, Raspberry Pi began shipping initial orders, with the first products sent to tech product launch sites in New York and the West Coast Bay Area.Upton’s photo at the West Coast tech developers conference, where Raspberry Pi co-founder Liz Upton said she wanted to create installation art in the office with the backgroundIn October 2012, the memory of Raspberry Pi Model B was expanded to 512MB.By the end of November 2012, the Raspberry Pi Model A sample was successfully produced at a price of $25. The final iterations of the original Raspberry Pi computers, such as Pi 1 Model A+ and B+, are still available for purchase today.Time changes, but devices with the same computing power have different sizes in different erasSome British tech enthusiasts lament that this microcomputer, which looks more like a motherboard, does not lack competitive products on the market.But truly, no competitor can update the operating system for ten years like Raspberry Pi, ensuring that even the oldest first-generation products can still be used.So far, about 46 million Raspberry Pis have been produced, although it has been a bit difficult to buy them due to supply chain issues in 2022.Now, Raspberry Pi also manufactures and designs its own chips and microcontrollers, opening up a whole new range of potential applications.Raspberry Pi chip
How to Make a Raspberry Pi?
Upton grew up with the BBC Micro: This was one of the two popular computers designed in Cambridge in the 1980s (the other was the Sinclair Spectrum), which taught an entire generation of British computer enthusiasts how to code.Micro not only inspired Upton’s love for programming but also made him a fan of low-cost computers.However, this treasure, which cost 350 pounds, was still too expensive for students.Therefore, Upton had the idea to create a “substitute” that would be ten times cheaper than the BBC Micro, so that ten times as many students could use it.However, achieving this required expertise in technology, industry trends, education, and manufacturing to design a low-cost, high-performance computer.Initially, Raspberry Pi was just a personal project. Upton was using his evenings and weekends to develop it at that time.Later, Upton gradually organized a team consisting of Robert Mullins and Alan Mycroft, professors from the Cambridge Computer Science and Technology Department, Cambridge entrepreneurs and angel investors Jack Lang, and other Cambridge computer scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs.Various design prototypes of Raspberry Pi displayed in the Cambridge University Computer Laboratory before its releaseFor Raspberry Pi, it had to meet four interrelated requirements:
It should be programmable hardware.
It should be fun: People in the 1980s might have become interested in computers because of games, but the nature of computers at that time meant that many of them encountered programming almost by accident. Raspberry Pi had to have the same level of fun and be able to meet young people’s expectations of a PC.
The price should be low enough: The team set a starting price of $25, partly because it’s about the cost of a textbook, and it’s low enough for most families to afford, and schools could subsidize a few families that couldn’t afford it.
It must be sturdy enough: Upton stated that they wanted children to own their Raspberry Pi, which means it must be able to withstand being put in and taken out of a backpack a thousand times.
Ultimately, a stable, powerful, and affordable Raspberry Pi was born in 2012.In 2013, Raspberry Pi won the INDEX Design Award; in 2017, it won the UK’s oldest engineering innovation award—the MacRobert Award from the Royal Academy of Engineering.Some nerds jokingly stated that considering cost, adaptability, ease of understanding, energy consumption, and multitasking performance, Raspberry Pi outperforms their girlfriends in all metrics
Today’s Raspberry Pi
As hardware itself, the Raspberry Pi family has developed significantly.There is the Raspberry Pi Pico for just $4, and the flagship Raspberry Pi 4 Model B with up to 8GB of memory (with 2GB and 4GB options available).Raspberry Pi 4Additionally, there is the all-in-one computer Raspberry Pi Model 400, which has similar performance to the Raspberry Pi 4 Model B and comes with 4GB of memory.Raspberry Pi 400For those who need smaller, cheaper circuit boards, there is the Raspberry Pi Zero series, which integrates Bluetooth and WiFi along with 512MB of SDRAM.Now, Raspberry Pi not only opens the world of programming to people of different ages and backgrounds. Its adaptability, stability, and low price make it an ideal choice for applications such as electric vehicles, IoT, or automated assembly lines.As a “computer”, one remarkable aspect of Raspberry Pi is that even the “old antiques” purchased in 2012 can still run the latest operating systems from 2022.
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