It was not so late, Beaglebone, which had already strived to provide open source hardware and software platform since 2008, also decided to compete in the niche and launched an even more powerful computing device – Beaglebone Black. Beaglebone had previously introduced open source products such as BeagleBoard and BeagleBoard-xM. These boards were more expensive compared to Raspberry Pi. So Black was launched in 2013 to compete with the Pi and attract electronics enthusiasts. Now, after the Raspberry Pi 2 and Pi 3, the Beaglebone Black seems to be losing its edge. Let's see how fair these pieces of advice are to each other.
Raspberry Pi or Beaglebone Black are for what?
These single-board computers are made for electronics hobbyists and computer professionals who want to develop software-oriented embedded electronics applications, where complicated programs to operate a variety of analog and/or digital peripherals need to be built and run on an operating system. A web server for transmitting audio and video messages or an IOT application are some good examples.
Prerequisites for working on Pi or Black
To work on Pi or Black, it is important that the aspirant has fundamental knowledge of Linux operating systems and basic knowledge of electronics. These boards run on Linux derivatives and are intended to be used in embedded electronics projects. If someone has some experience working on microcontrollers like 8051, AVR or PIC or on microcontroller boards like Arduino, this can help with the hardware aspect, but the real skill development on these boards continues with the software aspect, particularly exploring the ecosystem Linux in creating embedded applications.
Form Factors: Beaglebone Black WAS designed to be superior to Raspberry Pi, but NOW WHAT?
The Pi 1 was already on the market when the Black was launched. For obvious reasons, the Black was designed to be a superior computing device to the Pi. After the release of the third-generation Pi, many form factors that gave the Beaglebone Black an advantage are no longer relevant. While Black comes with a 1GHz ARM Cortex A8 AM3359 processor that uses the ARMv7 instruction set, the new Raspberry Pi Model 3 has a 1.2GHz 64-bit quad-core ARMv8 CPU. The Raspberry Pi 2 was also capable and used the same ARMv7 instruction set as the Black. The new Pi has a higher clock speed and now never needs to be overclocked to match the Black. The ARMv8 instruction set used by the new Pi is the latest addition to the ARM architecture. It is a fundamental change to the ARM architecture made to add 64-bit architecture and the Pi base has not failed to exploit this. With a 64-bit, multi-core processor architecture, the Raspberry Pi 3 isn't just a little faster. Additionally, ARMv8 provides user-space compatibility with the 32-bit ARMv7 instruction set.
In terms of RAM, the Raspberry Pi 2 has already been upgraded to 1GB RAM compared to 512MB RAM in black. Here, the Pi 3 maintains the legacy. The black has the advantage of having 4GB onboard eMMC storage along with the MicroSD card option, while the two latest Pi models come with the SD card option for storage.
Beaglebone Black is definitely no matchup in terms of processing power and raw form factors compared to Pi boards .
| Form Factors | Raspberry Pi 2 | Raspberry Pi 3 | Beagle board |
|---|---|---|---|
| Processor | 900 MHz quad-core
ARM Cotex-A7 CPU |
1.2GHz 64-bit quad-core
ARMv8 CPU |
1GHz TI Sitara AM3359
ARM Cortex A8 |
| Architecture | 32-bit | 64-bit | 32-bit |
| Instruction Set | ARMv7 | ARMv8 | ARMv7 |
| TO KNOCK | 1GB LPDDR2 | 1GB LPDDR2 | 512MB DDR3L |
| Store | S.D. | S.D. | 4GB integrated
eMMC,MicroSD |
Connectivity and expandability
Connectivity has been an area where the Beaglebone Black still stands out. It has 2 46-pin headers enabling 92 connections, many of which, despite being reserved, can be reconfigured for use. Of the 92 connections, the Beaglebone Black has 65 GPIO (general purpose input/output) pins, 2 I2C buses, 2 SPI buses, 7 analog inputs, 8 PWM outputs, 4 timers, 4 UARTs and 25 low latency PRU inputs/outputs . exit. Each Black digital I/O pin supports 8 different modes, including GPIO. The pin mapping of the Beaglebone Black is as follows –:
Beaglebone also provides a large central repository of Beaglebone skins. Beaglebone Capes are add-on cards that can be connected to the header pins to augment external peripherals to the Beaglebone SBC. A large number of Beaglebone capes are available on the official CircuitCo Capes page. Additionally, many third-party skins can also be found and purchased for use with the Beaglebone board.
Even the new Pi models are not very competent in this regard. The new Raspberry Pi 3 and Raspberry Pi 2 have a 40-pin header, of which there are 24 GPIO, an I2C bus, 2 SPI buses, 8 ground pins, JTAG, 2 5V power pins and 2 3V power pins. .3V. The pin map of Raspberry Pi 2 and 3 is as follows –:
The Raspberry Pi can also be augmented with external peripherals by connecting Hardware On Top (HAT) boards to the Pi's main pins. However, compared to the Beaglebone, the Pi has few add-on boards and no central repository from which to obtain them. However, due to the strong community support, it is really not difficult to find a suitable HAT for an application. And yes, there is one thing that has unimaginably improved the expandability of Raspberry Pi: Raspberry Pi Connection Bridge for Arduino Shields . It can be purchased from a third-party seller and has amazing tasks. You can connect any shield available for Arduino to the Raspberry Pi using these types of connection bridges. Arduino is a legendary class when hardware interfacing must be considered. These connection bridges gave entirely different dimensions and scope to the use of the Raspberry Pi. One of these connection bridges can be purchased from Cooking Hacks.
So choose a Beaglebone if the number of connections is important for your project, otherwise Raspberry Pi can also do a good job in connectivity and hardware interfacing.
Multimedia applications
No software-based application can impress without graphics and audio. Practically, working on any single-board computer requires interfacing a display unit with the board and getting a visual cue of everything that happens in executing the code. Here again, the Raspberry Pi seems to be the winner. The Pi comes with dual-core VideoCore IV and offers Open GL ES 2.0, hardware-accelerated OpenVG, and high-profile 1080p H.264 decoding. The integrated GPU is capable of 1Gpixels/1.5Gtexels or 24 GFLOPs with texture filtering and DMA infrastructure. It is equipped with full-sized HDMI port along with composite video output for lower quality video streaming. The Pi supports audio over HDMI and also provides 3.5mm audio jack.
On the other hand, the Beaglebone Black has an integrated graphics accelerator that supports 1024X786, 1280X720, 1440X900 and 1920X1080 resolutions with a maximum supported resolution of 1280X1024. It also does not have an integrated audio jack and needs to attach a cover for audio input and output. Even if a project's graphics requirements are not high, Beaglebone requires HDMI work for any audio or video processing. This can be very difficult for any beginner. On the other hand, the Pi has higher graphics specs and allows you to process audio from the on-board audio connector and video through HDMI or composite video connector, which is easier for beginners.
Network
The new Pi 3 has additional built-in network connections that make it unique for any networking application. The PI has 4 USB ports for communicating with other microcomputers, smartphones or desktop computers. Along with the Ethernet port, the Raspberry Pi 3 comes with built-in 802.11 wireless LAN, Bluetooth 4.1, and Bluetooth Low Energy. The Beaglebone has single USB host and client ports and contains only one built-in Ethernet port for network communication. Obviously, it's easier to connect a Raspberry Pi to a wireless network, whereas the Beaglebone Black will need a case for that. Both boards can be easily connected to a LAN, while more peripheral connections can be made on the Raspberry Pi due to the multiple USB ports.
Energy consumption
Energy consumption is a factor about which nothing can be said with certainty. Beaglebone provides an extensive manual where the current consumed by different sections of the board can be found. On a Raspberry Pi, such specifications are not open, as it uses a proprietary processor and SoC. Power consumption by different sections of a Pi board must be measured manually and the reading may differ from one board to another. It can be said that the Beaglebone has slightly lower power consumption and has open hardware specifications to verify this.
Setup and cost
Even though the Raspberry Pi seems more profitable, it's actually easier to start with a Beaglebone. It comes with built-in flash memory and default Linux-derived Debian installed. It can take no more than five minutes to set up a Beaglebone Black and get started. But be careful with graphics and audio applications, Black needs the engineer to derive audio and video from HDMI. There is no other option. Due to the built-in flash memory and standard Linux installation, all that is needed to get started with the Beaglebone Black is a Micro-HDMI cable, a Micro-SD card (optional but recommended), and a keyboard and display (with HDMI port ) to connect. On the other hand, a Raspberry Pi needs to purchase an SD card as it does not come with flash memory and requires manual installation of Raspbian or another Linux derivative. This may be a bit time consuming, but thanks to Raspberry Pi's large community base, it will take less effort as the guide for installing and running a Raspberry Pi can be easily found. To configure the Raspberry Pi, SD card, HDMI cable and Micro-USB cable are additional items that must be purchased.
While the Raspberry Pi 3 Model B costs $29.99 and a Beaglebone Black costs $50, the cost at the end of the day to set up either board could end up being the same. Cases for Beaglebone or HAT boards for Raspberry Pi may incur additional costs depending on the target application.
Community support
Raspberry Pi has a large community base and is quite popular among electronics enthusiasts. It will be easier to find a solution for any application if done on a Raspberry Pi with the available guidance. Beaglebone is just moving up the popularity chart, but community support isn't that widespread yet. If the project undertaken depends heavily on available community support, the Raspberry Pi has a definite advantage over the Beaglebone. However, no one stopped to trust their own intelligence and brainstorming if Beaglebone seems to be quick to set up and start experimenting.
Open source factor
Raspberry Pi is definitely more popular among hobbyists, but for prototyping a product, the Beaglebone might be a better choice. Beaglebone is an open hardware and software platform. All hardware specifications are open and can be found directly in the Beaglebone Black Manual. The manual is quite extensive and covers every detail, including hardware schematics and chip specifications. Raspberry Pi has open source hardware except ARM processor and Broadcom SoC. Its firmware is very closed source. Due to the use of the ARM processor and the Broadcom SoC, the Pi Foundation is bound by a confidentiality agreement with ARM and Broadcom and cannot open chip or processor specifications. However, the Pi foundation states that Pi boards can be used commercially with a recommendation that “Powered by Raspberry Pi” be mentioned anywhere on the product. Beaglebone being a complete open source platform can be modified and used in a commercial product without a doubt. Again, due to the lack of open processor and SoC hardware specifications, modifying a Raspberry Pi is practically impossible. But you can easily create your own version of Beaglebone.
Conclusion
Setting up a Beaglebone is easy and straightforward, but it lacks broad community support to progress further. Therefore, making a custom application on Beaglebone will require a bit of brainstorming due to the lack of online guidance and support. In that case, the Beaglebone Black manual is the definitive and most reliable guide to try. Setting up a Raspberry Pi is manual and takes time and effort on day one, but thanks to the large Raspberry Pi community, progressing on a Pi is much easier.
Blindly choose a Raspberry Pi for any embedded systems application that requires better computing power, high-resolution graphics, easy access to audio, connection to a wireless network or serial communication with other devices over a USB or needs to perform the application via of Arduino Shields. Opt for a Beaglebone for more hardware connections, easy expansion with skins, low-resolution graphics application, graphics and audio adjustments on the HDMI port, reliable power consumption, and modification of the SBC board itself.
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