Raspberry performance and use as basic PC

[Bombama]

Hi. I'm thinking about fixing grandma's old laptop that she uses for communication (websites, video calls), writing texts in Office programs, watching series and collecting and keeping family photos. Nothing demanding. Laptop is very old and weak, that's why I'm thinking maybe Raspberry will do the job. I never used Raspberry and I don't know if it's really usable as basic PC or it's just a demo with no relation to reality. The point is to make it quiet, low power consuming and use with TV instead of regular monitor to let grandma see things better on big screen, as she barely reads regular 15" screen.

I think if it's powerful enough, I don't mind building little setup with 2.5" SSD and 120 mm quiet fan. Would be interesting.

[Radium_Angel]

1 minute ago, Bombama said:

Would be interesting.

Not sure the RPi runs windows tho, you'd have to get her used to another OS

[Chris Pratt]

1 minute ago, Radium_Angel said:

Not sure the RPi runs windows tho, you'd have to get her used to another OS

No Windows on Raspberry Pi, but you can get something like a LattePanda instead to do that.

 

As far as, whether something like this would work in general, Linus did a vid on a "secret computer" where he built one into an old display. For the most part, it runs fine, but can struggle with video playback and some more extensive tasks.

[Likwid]

5 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Not sure the RPi runs windows tho, you'd have to get her used to another OS

Using skin would make it feel like windows.

[Bombama]

10 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Not sure the RPi runs windows tho, you'd have to get her used to another OS

That's not a problem. If I'll put shortcuts on taskbar in the same place, it'll be enough.

But I guess, I'd need to find and tweak programs for convenience, like image viewer and others. But things like browser, office text editor, telegram, skype, video player - remain the same, especially if I set "explorer" to look like on Windows.

 

I found out that people install full Win10 (non IoT version) but it's not usable for real tasks.

 

My concern with entire device is RAM and CPU. What if it'll be even slower than 10 years old laptop? I'm not expecting it to run Crysis, but I need it to switch between programs snappy and be responsive. So entire build would not feel like a gimmick.

[j.son19]

1 minute ago, Bombama said:

found out that people install full Win10

NOOBS (new out the box software) is the raspberry PI operating system installer although to install the IoT version your Pi has to be connected to a network. One of the things that stop me from using a raspberry Pi as a normal PC is you are quite limited with computing power. 

[Bombama]

20 minutes ago, j.son19 said:

to install the IoT version your Pi has to be connected to a network

it shouldn't be a problem since Pi 4 has WiFi built-in. Although I have spare USB WiFi.

Does IoT Windows 10 work as desktop or it's unusable?

[j.son19]

2 minutes ago, Bombama said:

Does IoT Windows 10 work as desktop or it's unusable?

Sorry I'm unsure as I have never used a raspberry Pi I just know a little about them as I was looking at getting one a while back.

[Mad153]

A raspberry pi is a great idea, but not sure if it would be quite practical.

Does her pc have an SSD in it? Upgrading to an SSD is a very cheap way to add perceived performance

[Bombama]

4 minutes ago, Mad153 said:

A raspberry pi is a great idea, but not sure if it would be quite practical.

Does her pc have an SSD in it? Upgrading to an SSD is a very cheap way to add perceived performance

It's falling apart. I would put SSD, it's not a problem, but I just can't look at a laptop when keys are coming out of keyboard. It's time for it to go.

But when I'm picking parts for ITX build, I can't stop at cheapest things, and ending up with Ryzen 3 or 5. I'd try Rpi, but I'll have to wait for delivery so I'd prefer to know for sure what performance to expect from it. Whether it's usable PC or just a toy like "mom, look, it loads Crysis!".

[Mad153]

Just now, Bombama said:

with Ryzen 3 or 5. I'd try Rpi, but I'll have to wait for delivery so I'd prefer to know for sure what performance to expect from it. Whether it's usable PC or just a toy like "mom, look, it loads Crysis!".

I would recommend looking at how the Snapdragon powered windows PCs perform as it will be about the same as the RPI. Mrmobile has covered many of these devices  and from what I remember, arm on windows works fine as long as you are running native ARM programs or web apps.

[dfsgsfa]

5 minutes ago, Bombama said:

Whether it's usable PC or just

theres a project in feb that pi3 and pi4 runs windows, but only limited to 1gb ram AND no native usb hubs, 

[steelo]

1 hour ago, Bombama said:

Hi. I'm thinking about fixing grandma's old laptop that she uses for communication (websites, video calls), writing texts in Office programs, watching series and collecting and keeping family photos. Nothing demanding. Laptop is very old and weak, that's why I'm thinking maybe Raspberry will do the job. I never used Raspberry and I don't know if it's really usable as basic PC or it's just a demo with no relation to reality. The point is to make it quiet, low power consuming and use with TV instead of regular monitor to let grandma see things better on big screen, as she barely reads regular 15" screen.

I think if it's powerful enough, I don't mind building little setup with 2.5" SSD and 120 mm quiet fan. Would be interesting.

The only rpi, I'd even consider for daily use is the rpi4 with at least 2gb or RAM. She'd have to learn how to use Raspbian though, which isn't hard...I doubt she'd be using terminal though. The OpenOffice suite isn't bad at all to use. As far as Netflix, hulu, etc, I believe there is an extension you can add to the chromium browser within Raspbian. Just have it set up and bookmarked so all she has to do is go to the page.

 

However, it does use a SD card which aren't nearly as durable (or fast) as SSD's. It will inevitably 'wear out' a lot faster...

 

If she'd be willing to stray from Windows, a cheap Chromebook may be another option for light usage...They are powerful enough to stream and shouldn't have any issues with what you said she'd be doing.

[steelo]

23 minutes ago, dfsgsfa said:

theres a project in feb that pi3 and pi4 runs windows, but only limited to 1gb ram AND no native usb hubs, 

Yeah, they will 'run' Win10 but are virtually unusable.

[Bombama]

23 minutes ago, steelo said:

However, it does use a SD card which aren't nearly as durable (or fast) as SSD's

Is there a way to connect SATA SSD? Wouldn't it work better through USB than SD card? I have SATA to USB connector (both USB A and USB C options). It can give over 300 MB/s bandwidth but I don't know if Rpi can have advantage from that.

 

23 minutes ago, steelo said:

If she'd be willing to stray from Windows, a cheap Chromebook may be another option for light usage...They are powerful enough to stream and shouldn't have any issues with what you said she'd be doing.

I don't want a laptop. The idea of Rpi fits perfectly in usage - I can connect it to her TV and she can use it from chair. Recently saw her sitting at the desk watching series on laptop and it looks inconvenient. I think she wouldn't like to mess with HDMI to connect it to the TV. But I guess I have to assemble Rpi and experiment on my own to figure out how it'll work in my case. Because all I can find is demos like "you can launch web browser and watch movies". But no real experience from people who tried to use it as real desktop.

[dfsgsfa]

14 minutes ago, steelo said:

Yeah, they will 'run' Win10 but are virtually unusable

its a programming issue ,can be fixed in no time.who knows

[dfsgsfa]

 

[kelvinhall05]

What laptop is it?

 

Don't get anything ARM-based if you want Windows. Depending on what laptop it is, might make more sense to change thermal paste and clean it up, then toss in an SSD and maybe RAM upgrade.

[pythonmegapixel]

Trying to run Windows on a Raspberry Pi is a non-starter. RPi was never designed to run Windows so it'll be a nuisance to set up and probably also painfully slow. Don't bother.

 

But... getting your grandma used to another OS might not be a big task. In fact, if her PC is 10 years old then on the front end the change from Win 7 to Win 10 might actually be a bigger step than the change from Win 7 to a fairly Windows-similar Linux desktop environment. Similarly the step from modern-day LibreOffice to Microsoft Office of 10 years ago probably isn't that drastic.

 

In response to your original question, my Pi 2 was perfectly usable as a very basic PC 2 years ago, and it's improved in leaps and bounds since then. If you buy the highest end model (4GB RAM) and use an external HDD/SSD device over USB for any important files (SD cards will wear out) then you'll be fine for almost all basic computing tasks. (Of course, don't expect amazing power, you aren't going to be gaming or editing HD video on this thing!).

 

Honestly I'd say go for it, if you have the money. An RPi isn't very expensive and if your grandma does't like it then I'd be quite surprised if you are of a "techy" persuasion and can't find a use for it somewhere else.

 

Incidentally Chromium might be a good choice (open source RPi-oriented version of Google ChromeOS) thanks to its simple modern interface and similarity to a mobile phone interface (if your grandma has one of those already). https://github.com/FydeOS/chromium_os-raspberry_pi

 

Also if you have a bit more to spend and want a Windows machine there's things like the Intel NUC which are more designed for this application but not as good for the price.

[Letgomyleghoe]

4 hours ago, Radium_Angel said:

Not sure the RPi runs windows tho, you'd have to get her used to another OS

The pi3 can run a Windows specifically designed for it

[Letgomyleghoe]

1 hour ago, pythonmegapixel said:

Trying to run Windows on a Raspberry Pi is a non-starter. RPi was never designed to run Windows so it'll be a nuisance to set up and probably also painfully slow. Don't bother.

There’s litteraly a version of Windows meant to run on the pi3

 

2 hours ago, steelo said:

Yeah, they will 'run' Win10 but are virtually unusable.

There’s a version of Windows meant for the pi3

[pythonmegapixel]

10 minutes ago, Letgomyleghoe said:

There’s litteraly a version of Windows meant to run on the pi3

 

There’s a version of Windows meant for the pi3

There is, however it's not designed or supported for what one would consider general home use, but rather for IoT and embedded systems where it will be running one application, headless, at once. It doesn't even have a desktop.

 

The only way to install the desktop version is via unsupported, unofficial and convoluted means. This is not guaranteed to work, it is unlikely to be particularly stable and apparantley can only access 1GB of RAM which is just one of several hardware comaptibility issues.

[steelo]

4 hours ago, dfsgsfa said:

its a programming issue ,can be fixed in no time.who knows

Well, it's more than that...Win10 (at least the version we are all familiar with) does not natively run on ARM processors...yet.

 

So, the code has to be converted before it is able to be ran on the ARM processor...that's why it is painfully slow to run.

[steelo]

2 hours ago, Letgomyleghoe said:

There’s litteraly a version of Windows meant to run on the pi3

 

There’s a version of Windows meant for the pi3

Do you mean Win10 IoT core? Trust me, it's not what you think it is...it's a severely trimmed down OS meant for hobbyists to 'tinker' with. It's in no way comparable to Windows 10.

 

Raspberry pi  (raspbian) OS would probably work a lot better and have more functionality. I believe you CAN connect a SSD to it, but it takes a bit of work...

[steelo]

4 hours ago, Bombama said:

Is there a way to connect SATA SSD? Wouldn't it work better through USB than SD card? I have SATA to USB connector (both USB A and USB C options). It can give over 300 MB/s bandwidth but I don't know if Rpi can have advantage from that.

 

I don't want a laptop. The idea of Rpi fits perfectly in usage - I can connect it to her TV and she can use it from chair. Recently saw her sitting at the desk watching series on laptop and it looks inconvenient. I think she wouldn't like to mess with HDMI to connect it to the TV. But I guess I have to assemble Rpi and experiment on my own to figure out how it'll work in my case. Because all I can find is demos like "you can launch web browser and watch movies". But no real experience from people who tried to use it as real desktop.

A rpi4 (with at least 2 gb RAM and a 'fast' 64gb SD card) would probably suit her fine for watching series and general word processing...it's not going to be the fastest thing in the world and I would look into how to boot off of a SSD. I think there are youtube videos of folks who did get that to work. Raspberry pi OS is very well laid out and should be simple for her to use...I'm sure you can also add cloud functionality too for storage.

 

For the record, I have several rpi zeroes and a rpi3 with the original sd cards going on 2 years with no issues...I use my rpi3 all of the time for tinkering with python...it's not terribly slow navigating the OS or using OpenOffice. It does struggle though with web browsing. However it is quite a bit slower than a rpi4 and only has 1 gb of RAM...