Raspberry Pi's 20-Year Journey: From University Prototype to Best-Selling British Computer
The Raspberry Pi Interactive Timeline · 2006–2026
An interactive timeline traces the Raspberry Pi from its 2006 origins as a response to declining computer science applicants at Cambridge to its 2026 status as a global phenomenon. Key milestones include the 2012 launch that crashed servers, the 2015 Pi Zero's magazine cover debut, the 2021 shift to in-house chip design with the RP2040, and the Pi 5's introduction of official PCIe support. The timeline highlights the Foundation's evolution from education charity to industrial supplier, with over two-thirds of sales now going to embedded customers.
The plan had been a small production run for British school kids; it turned into the beginning of the best-selling British computer of all time.
- walrus01
I know RAM prices aren't under control of the raspberry pi project, but something has gone dreadfully wrong in the economy when individual 8GB+ raspberry pi are now costing $200 to $300 for just the board before you add USB-C power supply, heatsinks, case, etc.
If a person doesn't need GPIO pins or other direct access to hardware [1], I don't understand why people are trying to use them with 1080p and 4K displays, keyboards and mice as general desktop linux computers. You can get a far more capable small form factor or ultra small form factor used Intel Core i5/i7 something corporate desktop with 16GB of RAM and a real SSD for like 150 bucks on eBay (USD). It'll be significantly faster.
Install barebones debian amd64, 'sudo apt install xfce4-desktop', it'll pull in all the xorg and other dependencies and also install a GUI login screen.
20 seconds of searching turned up something that doesn't suck: https://www.ebay.com/itm/820084016851?_skw=dell+optiplex+16G...
The one raspberry pi model which is still close to the original's $35 price is the raspberry pi model 4 1GB which is $49 in Canada. Accounting for inflation and difference between USD:CAD, that's about the same as 35 bucks. I think there are still a ton of uses for raspberry pi 3B+ or model 4 1GB particularly because you can power them off an 802.3af power over ethernet switch and cable, to stick one in a weird place with power and ethernet in one cable, with a basic $15 PoE splitter to USB-C power on the load end. [2] […]
- kh_hk
A lot of the vibecoded interactive experiences remind me of these interactive books i had as a kid where you would open different hidden parts to explore. At some point it gets boring, i do not want to click one million times to find the information I am looking for. So, it is not interactive, this is a chore.
- graycrow
My PC runs Linux now because I bought the Raspberry Pi back in 2012, and I'm very grateful for that.
- merpkz
Raspberry Pi Zero 2 is the sweet spot these days for price/performance, but it's nowhere to by found in stock, sadly despite the fact it has LPDDR2 type of RAM
- Joeboy
For the people who are sad about the high prices of the Pi range, I want to mention that I'm having a lot of fun with the Pi Pico 2. It's obviously not quite the same thing (ie. not a regular desktop computer), but it's ridiculously capable for its few-dollars price point. There's a lot you can do with it.
If you just want a cheap computer the Pi's don't seem so great these days, but the Picos are where the fun is now.