Raspberry Pi, the original $25 PC, now smaller than a credit card and costs just $20

When the Raspberry Pi Foundation announced way back in 2011 that it would release a complete PC for $25, we were dubious — but hey, here we are in 2014 and Raspberry Pi has been a massive success story, with thousands of units sold at the promised $25 price point. Today, the Foundation is releasing the Raspberry Pi Model A+ — a smaller, cheaper version of the Model A. The A+ costs just $20, and you can buy it today from Farnell in the UK or MCM in the US. Amusingly enough, the A+ is now smaller than credit-card sized.
As you probably know, technology has a habit of getting smaller — we adopt smaller connectors, redesign board layouts, combine multiple chips into single packages, and process nodes step down from 90nm to 45nm to 28nm. Therefore, it stands to reason that the Model A+ is significantly smaller than the original Model A — the A+ is now just 65mm x 56.5mm, down from 85.6mm x 56.5mm for the Model A. With the size reduction and fewer components, the Model A+ is about half the weight (23 grams vs. 45 grams).


Raspberry Pi Model A+, side-on, with a too-shallow depth of field

 
Raspberry Pi Model A+, hooked up to a screen, playing HD video. (Cables, screen, etc. not included.)

While it’s nice to talk about the inexorable march of miniaturization, the main reason the Model A+ is smaller is that the Foundation removed some of the larger components. The composite video RCA jack has been removed (composite video is now available through the 3.5mm headphone jack), and the SD card slot on the back of the board has been replaced with a micro SD slot. Remove a few components, redesign the PCB a bit (the A+ looks a lot like the recently announced B+), and voila: You have a much smaller computer. The smaller parts list obviously helped the Foundation bring the price down from $25 to $20, but I’m sure the main Broadcom BCM2835 SoC costs significantly less than three years ago, too.


Specs-wise, the Model A+ is virtually identical to the A — the same ARM SoC clocked at 700MHz, the same 256MB of RAM, the same HDMI video output. The Model A+ massively increases the number of GPIO pins, though, from 26 pins to 40 — the same number of GPIO pins as the larger Model B+, and they’re in the same physical location along the top edge, which might be useful in some compatibility related circumstances. The other important improvement on the A+ is that it (reportedly) uses 1 watt — down from 1.5W for the Model A, and 3W for the Model B+. In the case of the Model B+, the additional power consumption is mostly due to the Ethernet socket — I’m not sure how the folks at Raspberry Pi axed the Model A’s power consumption by 50%, except for some updated components (maybe the BCM2835 went through a process shrink?)
The Model A+ should be fully cross-compatible with Model A, B, and B+ applications. The B and B+ have twice as much RAM, but as you can see in the videos above, the A+ still runs Minecraft: Pi Edition and HD video just fine. All in all, the Model A+ for $20 is a great deal — but its single USB port definitely makes it more oriented towards DIY hardware hacking, while the Model B+, with its four USB ports and Ethernet socket, is still a better option for a low-power Linux box or home-theater PC.
You can buy the Raspberry Pi Model A+ from Farnell in the UK, and MCM in the US — but more stockists will appear soon, I’m sure.
Extreme tech