Inspired by Argus Swift's Raspberry Pi thread, let's have a discussion about the other computer-on-a-card system, the Beagle Board.

They're a bit more expensive than the Raspberry Pi, but they're also much more powerful, for instance, the BeagleBoard-XM contains a 1Ghz ARM with 512MB of RAM. It also contains an on-board 10/100 Ethernet connection. Although the price is a little bit more steep, $179 is actually quite the bargain for a pre-assembled computer of that caliber.

There's also the upcoming BeagleBone, which is essentially a smaller BeagleBoard at a cheaper price. Of course it loses a few features that make the BeagleBoard great (Such as a video adapter) but for the ultra-low suggested price of $89 one really can't complain.

I'm thinking about probably getting an XM or maybe a BeagleBone to use as a home server just so my music and other stored files are accessible in my whole house without leaving my main desktop on. That actually makes the BeagleBone great because I'll be able to just SSH into it with no need for a dedicated monitor and keyboard solution, plus, I'll get the benefit of learning how to do a net install.

Anyway, is there anyone else thinking about getting one of these bad boys?

Hm... Definitely very interesting. The cost is much higher (comparatively)than the Pi, but seems much more powerful.


I would go with the Pi first, just to see how it is and test it out, but if it wasn't powerful enough to play episodes of stuff off of, I would definitely get a Beagleboard. Having the option of a higher-end version of kind of the same thing is always great to have.

I'll be sure to check these out soon.