Can a Raspberry Pi 4 be used as a Desktop PC - Full test and review
Вставка
- Опубліковано 19 жов 2024
- Hey All! In this video I take a look to see if the Rasperry Pi 4 can be used as a daily desktop PC.
Shout-out to:
A4 Andre on Twitch: / a4andre
Mr. Belb on Twitch: / mrbelb
Commands/Links:
Temperature monitor: watch vcgencmd measure_temp
Raspbian: www.raspberryp...
Activity monitor: htop
RPi fan: amzn.to/32zc7Je
Full disclosure: BuyAPi.ca offered me a discount on my purchase as they knew I'd be reviewing it.
Available in USA here:
www.pishop.us/...
Available in Canada here:
www.buyapi.ca/...
Description:
Full desktop computer kit - just connect to HDMI display(s)
Specification
Raspberry Pi 4 Desktop kit is supplied with:
Raspberry Pi 4 Model B, 4GB
Raspberry Pi Keyboard & Mouse
2 × micro HDMI to Standard HDMI (A/M) 1m Cables
Raspberry Pi 15.3W USB-C Power Supply
Raspberry Pi 4 Case
Official Raspberry Pi Beginner's Guide (English language)
16GB NOOBS with Raspbian microSD card
DISCLAIMER: This description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I will receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.
#RPi4 #RaspberryPi #RPi #Tech #Raspbian #Computers #DesktopPC #Linux
Commands/Links:
Temperature monitor: watch vcgencmd measure_temp
Raspbian: www.raspberrypi.org/downloads...
Activity monitor: htop
RPi fan: amzn.to/32zc7Je
cant u just submerge the PI in mineral or vegetable oil for cooling, we did it to al old alfa adaptor that was cutting out from heat, works like a charm
this video is almost too nerdy for me. i dont know if i should keep watching this or watch something cool like doom eternal walkthrough
funnny how everyone's definiion of desktop PC is a browser that can play UA-cam.
Most non power users don't care about gaming or editing anything super big that would require rendering of video or anything like that, chances are they are not going to be running any complicated programs or compiling code, so most really don't need much. Power users, at least half would be happy with the sbc, but gamers and editors/producers, are not going to enjoy this much.
I seen a pi can run Minecraft java, but that doesn't even matter, I can host a 50 player server running 4gb ddr3 ram in Minecraft 😂
Maybe not in 2019 but in 2020 it surely is :) But seriously, when you buy a PC/laptop and the seller says, yes, it can do all stuff you need, except err... youtube videos. Ok, no youtube, but it's not huge man come on. And it could be expected without good working HW acceleration. At least not Firefox on Raspbian. Yes, 4th generation of the most popular SBC and in it's best supported OS graphic acceleration is still a shady business..
(Cough cough)
@@geocam2 I believe you are correct.. I am watching this video on my Pi right now. :-)
to define something as "life" is about breath, consume energy, and produce. but that's not what we call "living" huh?
it's the simplest thing that you can do with a pc, so a good starting point.
There's a certain irony to watching this on my current main computer, a Pi 4.
OMG SAME the frame rate is perfect i added an extra 8gb SWAP to make it faster i am using 32-bit kali linux and it works perfectly plus i am booting off a 128GB sd card
hakder gaming what’s a SWAP
Sorry if it seemed dumb but I am new to pi’s
@@Sol_Creations06 Its a special partition for extending RAM. Same thing as windows pagefile.
@@Startpolice yes i actually did just overclock the CPU to 1.75 Ghz or more overclock the GPU to 600 Mhz and swap some extra ram and make sure you are booting off a decent sized sd card (128GB) and you will have a perfect desktop experience!!! however i do use kali linux not raspian so it may be a bit different
@@hakdergaming what about 3d modelling softwares,maya,zbrush etc?
I'm using a 4gb version I added a passive cooler and overclocked to 2ghz after upgrading the firmware and youtube works fine on chromium. totally usable as a desktop replacement
Lee Crocker how to overclock it?
@@roblga1251 Look online
use vivaldi is much better and faster than chromium
fun but not ideal.
... for me.
You forgot to add to add "totally usable as a desktop replacement FOR ME".
And then, to make it meaningful, say what you use your desktop for.
I'm just about to buy a pi4. This video addressed many of my concerns. Great content. Thanks
Thanks for watching!
The Odroid N2 is much better.I bought a "Atomic Pie" as well. Once you get past the quirky uefi only bios it actually does work much better than any Arm chip.
Thousands of videos showing how to set up the Pi but this is the first to show it in action. Well done.
This is the video I was looking for! Great job, it really shows everyday usage scenarios, with useful info like the temperatures.
Just purchased a Pi4, and appreciate your testing it out for us. Thanks so much!
2020 outdated, lots of fixes, massive improvements etc
basically pi 4 4gb is totally fixed by updates
Great RPi 4 review! It helped me very much to eval for my project before purchasing. Keep it up, regards!
Thanks for sharing your tests. Isn't Chromium the only browser on the pi that supports the graphics/video acceleration? i think the graphic stack on the Pi is still not open source - I think vlc just recently got around to it, so maybe some tests with video players might get you better performance. However, I think a used thinkpad in the same price range as pi + sd-card + power supply should still outperform the pi by magnitudes.
I think the performance model should be the "A" footprint and the budget tinker the "B". If the Pi foundation doesn't evolve then the Odroid N2 or H2 will take a bigger piece of the pie as time goes on. It has come to the point when it is mandatory to at least have some passive cooling on the 4 because it will clock down real easy. The same goes for the 3B+.
Chromium comes installed with h264ify, This creates less CPU load whilst on UA-cam
Waterfox Classic also works well on UA-cam
Yep. vp07 and vp08 are dogs. vpo9 is better but youtube availability is selective.
Nah, its more like to the nature of firefox and chromium. Firefox rely more on the cpu, while chromium, just like chrome, rely on RAM. Pi4 have better memory management than Pi3. So its better to use chromium.
I have tested Pi3 before with python, so this not really applicable to Pi4. For program that accessing small amount of data, its better to rely on CPU, while accessing data stored on storage (like accessing file) or larger data, its better to rely on RAM. So if you try to open wikipedia on firefox, its faster than chromium as the page doesn't need much data, but with page with animation, video, its faster on chromium, as its stored on ram, which its optimized for. Not as in efficient usage of RAM (as i know chromium is memory hogging), but it prioritize to use RAM for caching rather than CPU cache.
Well, this is just based on my own final essay experiment on Pi3, but I think my conjecture can be tested.
Great Videos. I am new to the Rasp Pi hardware and software and these videos have been so much help. Great job
Exactly the demo I was looking for, thank you sir! You got a new sub =D At least it does pretty good w/ retro gaming ;)
Good clear informative video, mate, and thanks for not saying "I'm going to go ahead and..." like lots of other UA-camrs do ;-)
Please don't use background music throughout the entire video. Very distracting :-( Otherwise, great video!
DigereTech / I agree, it’s not helpful for people with hearing problems
Shut up
@@switchyp0074 Umm, how about... No ;-)
Professionally done. Subscribed with pleasure!
Great video thank you Mr. Sujano !
You can use the 4B as a desktop, but don't expect it to be all that peppy. I got my first computer in the mid-'80s, so I recall the days when full-sized computers that you'd pay a couple of thousand for were far less powerful than any RPi. I have mine running 24/7 with SETI@Home running when I'm not using it, which is most of the time. One use I put it to is posting five dictionary words of the day from various online dictionaries to a Facebook group for puns and wordplay. I have two 24" monitors. It's very handy to have the dictionary webpage on one screen with the second screen is used to write the entry. I do it in the middle of the night with my main computer shut down in the living area. The Pi is set up in my bedroom and while working on it is considerably slower than my main computer, it's quicker overall to just turn on the screens, do my entries, then turn the screens off as opposed to going to the main machine, waiting for it to boot, then waiting for Firefox to load the many tabs I have open. Then I have to shut it down again for power savings. Is it a great desktop replacement? I'd say no unless your usage is very light and undemanding. It works, but it brings back '90s-era clunkiness.
With cooling you can overclock it and when you have done that it runs good. 👍
Why use Firefox instead of the built in browser that's most likely been optimised for the launch?
Good question! I wanted to test the load installing an application, and I wanted to test out the experience with different browsers. I could have edited out the Firefox bit, but I kept it in to show the difference between optimized and not. I fully expect more applications to be better optimized in time, which would make the Pi even more feasible for a light duty PC.
Because Chromium is still Google-developed even though it's considered "open."
It still has issues with privacy and transparency (blobs)
@@SB-qm5wg That's irrelevant, he only used Firefox because he preferred it but that's not testing the stock browser and therefore skews the performance test. At the very least he could have tested both browsers to see if there was a difference.
@@goto-sr1nx I switched to chromium at 11:58 in the video
Pretty amazing that an SBC can do this.
Take the URL and open VLC player and copy the link into there. It will play in full 1080 without stutter.
but then it's a hack, a workaround.
Conclusion: it's not a viable daily driver.
@@AQHackAQ That is the point. It works.
@@WHNorthcote The point is it's not a viable & proper desktop PC replacement
@@AQHackAQ Are you saying that it has to have full PC capability or as a SBC that has a workaround where you can use it as VLC lets you use it? Either way it is a PC. It is a computer that is yours and you are personally responsible, hence PC.
From the looks of it, its worth it, especially for the money.
It will be great as a lab/garage/machineshop-computer as a controller that you can use to monitor and drive real time applications. Add sensors etc. and put switches on and off.
Yes this is a mighty machine for a low price!
With MS effectively ending support for Win7 in 2020 my wife has 'volunteered' to try a RPi 4 with 4 GB RAM as her daily driver. She primarily uses YT, email, and MS Office apps. If necessary, I have her desktop (Acer something) still readily available for use by pushing a couple of buttons (one monitor, keyboard, & mouse used by both computers.) I haven't tried PIP or split screen yet but I'd bet that's possible though currently only one video output is viewable at a time. I have the printer function of an HP all-in-one working for both. She uses Libre Office on the RPi. Interestingly she has only used the Acer once in the past few weeks and that was just to retrieve a spreadsheet which she then used on and printed via the RPi. Unless the sw one uses is not available via Raspbian (or other OS RPi supports) then, so far, the $100 (all in) RPi 4 as a daily driver for the 'casual user' works admirably (serious gamers, video editors, et. al. look elsewhere). Definitely use a heat sink on and a miniature fan above the CPU (fan obtains power from the GPIO). As a desk jockey, in order to experiment with Linux and RPi further, I plan to include a RPi 4 in the case of my next AMD desktop build.
You could try Linux Mint Cinnamon on the old Acer for your wife. Not only is it super familiar for Win 7 users, it is a lot snappier. I started using Mint as my daily driver when I saw the preview of Win 10 at work. That day I went home and backed up my data, erased my aging Win XP computer and put Mint on it.
Several years on and its been great, I'm happier with this than I was with any version of Windows .. clear back to 3.11. Its super easy, I only use the console because some of the more esoteric tools I use are console only.
Also in the spring of 2018, I got a new 8th gen i7 laptop. Naturally it came with Windows 10, which I booted up to make sure the machine worked and to update the BIOS. After that I nuked it LOL .. Linux Mint handled all the hardware with zero fuss on the first go.
@@Charlesincharge42 I had my neighbor try MINT when his Win8 laptop started having problems. He does everything he was doing before with no problems. I have Mint on 3 pcs and and use Win10 on 2 others because of specific programs I need.
Great video as usual. I use my Pi with Lakka and libreelec and had no problems with it. There is a aluminum case with double fans you should try out costs under 20 bucks and cools really good
thanks, mate, I am looking forward to testing it!
So the answer is yes, IF there's solid cooling in place alongside overclocking. Sounds good!
Thanks for the video . You made my mind up....
Hi. After your video i think about to use a respberry pi as a daily computer! Thanks a lot!
Greetings from Sweden
I use iMac but i'll need an affordable computer option like R-Pi 4 while I save for another computer when this one breaks down, video was great thanks for pointing out helpful info.
Thanks for review and testing and its time to buy the newest Raspberry PI.
So basically you could play any game on stadia using a raspberry pi 4, at least on 720p.... what a time to be alive
Great video man! I subscribed 👍
I just ordered a raspberry pi 4 this morning. Is there places to go that people share the bash scripts? I don't know python and figured I would start by doing small projects that people has written the scripts to get use to using the pi first.
who use shit SD card corrupted manytime and not working fast and sure newer, no thanks, old HDD or SSD have lot better sure start and lot fasten and sure working. make usb boot and thats it all.
The Pi handles UA-cam better on Chromium because it is preloaded with an extension called H264ify. This extension switches UA-cam to stop using newer formats (like VP9) which are faster to deliver, but take longer and more effort to process on older systems.
I plan to buy a raspberry pi 4 4gb ram. Should I buy it? Because I want to use it for c++ development and generally programming. And what os is better I think is Manjaro OS.
I have been using it for programming for a while and it has been working very well. I suggest using and buying the raspberry pi 4 desktop starter kit
@@mrwinkls2234 Ok but I think rpi4 4gb ram has overheating problems.
@@teamplus9362 not really, if your heatsinks are placed correctly, and you aren't looking to run some hyperealistic spaceflight simulator or something, it should be fine.
Did you turn on hardware acceleration for the youtube video playback? I know its turned off by default and you have to turn it on manually. This offloads the video encoding to the gpu which is much more capable than the cpu at this task. I know at launch this option was disabled but should have been enabled on the official release of buster.
How can I check this? I just got my pi4 a couple days ago.
go to chromium settings page, Google it
Great video. Can I use a Pi4 4GB for stock graph monitoring? I want to have a few (4) graphs open to see price action etc.
Yes I'm looking into the world of Pi and looking to retire an old 32 bit machine. I like what I see and I think ti Pi will do what I want.
Thank you so much for the review
Firefox versus Chromium was an eye-opener!
So quick comment, I am not sure as I have not tried out the pi4 - but - does firefox support oxmplayer for streaming?? seeing that the older pi's that used oxmplayer to stream could use hardware, I was wondering if you knew if firefox indeed support oxmplayer for streaming which should give you a better play at higher resolution.
great testing and explaining
Cool video man, subbed! :)
Interesting - depending on your computer needs this could be an inexpensive solution.
Yes, if you have loads of time to waste and you really can't spend a euro more than 60 bucks + sdcard + peripherals. For any other humans that value their time you're better off with a Ryzen 3.
I've been using mine a a desktop for a couple weeks now and it works for me (I'm even using it to comment)
Screen tearing, correct me if I am wrong, is a "feature" of Xorg, you could add double buffering, which will add sometimes noticeable delay or use smarter window manager, that will however not solve the issue completely.
To update your raspian operating system:
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade
After you receive your new Pi 4, don't forget to also update the firmware with the following command..
sudo rpi-update
Impressive.
As someone who plays no computer games and whose Internet is too slow for 720 vid, I would like to have seen how this handled local video (does it have a local video player?) and a few office programs running with a some big files open.
Perhaps that does not even constitute a worthwhile test of this machine.
I wouldn't know... which is why I wanted to see it.
Be careful unplugging it, you can kill the Micro SD card if you do not shut it down before cutting power
Question what sd card are you using for speed improvement and also I seen ppl running it from ssd drive maybe that would improve performance can you do a video on that btw I'm new to the pie community looking forward on getting on great vid merry Christmas to all
I configured a very nice looking xfce desktop under raspbian on mine, and it would be a pretty usable desktop PC if I could get the youtube to play on 1080p without dropping frames. That part is a deal-breaker for modern desktop use, but other than that, it's quite usable for most office work. Also, Firefox is terribly sluggish compared to Chromium. I don't know why.
good job Sir Mr Sujano you very good english and also very clear explanation God job sir I subscribed your good channel.
Instead of running HTOP in a console window to monitor CPU usage, and another to monitor the CPU temperature, why not just enable the panel applets so they will appear on the task bar near the clock?
I could have, but I had all that info up there for me. I edited a bunch out where I was monitoring processes
I just got two pies 4 and 3b+ both are going into weecades and being used in pc form to listen to records and basic computer work. Printing and file transfers
Btw Logitech k400 plus keyboard with track pad works out the box including its hot keys
i ran dual display 1080while wtaching videos and still had heat issues. i cant see this fully replacing a pc with the thermal problems
The Pi4 runs surprisingly hot!
Mr. Sujano defective software. I icecooled mines
With the Argon one case mine stays about 45c under normal use.
Do you recommend the 8gb model that is out now? Or is the 4gb plenty?
I wanted A Raspberry Pi 4 with 4Gb, So I bought it... Overclocked it at 2 GHz... Put it in a nice Argon One Case and I am now using it to record music and also as a DAW... Am I happy with it? I have two more powerful Laptops and I think the Raspberry Pi 4 it is what it is... A little inexpensive one board PC that is good for surfing the Internet, everyday basic computer use, writing documents, and yes, recording music and as a Mini DAW...
Better option is docker and few virtual machines @ Pi4
This may sound funny but this is the first video that has actually answered a big question that I have asked about the Raspberry Pi, could it substitute for a cheap laptop by being able to connect it to my TV and stream movies and browse the Internet etc. As this video has shown me it cannot. Thank you. Now I know to avoid the product. Even though it sort of worked it was far too complicated and it just felt like so much effort had to be put in just to keep it from melting.
Did you configure FireFox so it actually uses hardware acceleration?
You don't have to buy a second SD card to install Retropie and awkwardly swap out the SD card each time. Surely it's possible to set up multiple operating systems on one SD card and have some boot manager.
Pi 5 is where it'll be. Just not yet.
Few things I didn't like:
You mention not liking Chromium, and prefer Firefox. Why?
You mention getting the 4gb over any of the other models. If I'm not in IT, other than 4 being higher than 1 or 2, I won't understand why.
I do more than watch UA-cam. What about working on documents and spreadsheets? Sharing documents? What about printing out documents? Email?Can my kids do homework? Can I do my taxes?
Does it play games other than emulated games? Are there games made for the Pi?
What about temperature? Does that stock case keep the pi from overheating if I'm playing games or watching UA-cam?
I'm just saying that if i want to to be able to use this little board as my computer, I'd need it to do more than boot up and play UA-cam.
I been on board with Raspberry Pi onto their early years. Still haven't got a Raspberry Pi 4 yet. But yes it's nice to have as many SD/mini-SD cards. I have 6 *SD cards for variety Pi projects. Better then reinstalling on just one SD card.
"It doesn't run UA-cam or videos smoothly!"
*makes no attempt to install or compile a version of Firefox that supports hardware decode on the Pi*
I'd love to see you show a how to of setting up retro pi. I tried it a bit ago and I could not get it to work. Your stuff is great!
Instructions unclear. Image written to Drive C
The next Pi really needs an on board media encoder/decoder. Then you can not only watch smooth videos, but also edit some really rudimentary videos.
I use the Pi 4 (4 gb model) as a work machine, which is primarily web-based tasks on a 34" curved monitor without issue. I did find that Chromium performs much better than Firefox. Though was bummed that there isn't a version of Brave for the Pi.
Would be great, it is still not there yet.
cromium have big problem, flicking screen if start and freeze all pc if looking video and make pause then need start all pc new again ,plug power off and start new again, manytime/day. not good raspian.
This helps my decision.
OOT question : I presume that Sujano is not your real name, wondering how did you get the name?
nice channel, just subscribed.
Thanks for letting me know not to invest in a Pi 4 and m.2 to use as my media center for living room, instead Im going to use my laptop.
does using two raspberry pi in a cluster make it any better performance
4GB and cooling a MUST
Did you do the latest fw update?
Wondering how well Ubuntu works.
I'll test it out
Not sure, but Chromium might be patched to do hardware video decoding as it is not the official one from debian repos. There some note in the last release notes that made me think it's vaapi/omx enabled. That makes Chrome better for online videos then Firefox, also no cpu load or temp increase. I'd love to see some demos on screen recording on rasberry pi 4, as the GPU is hardware encoding capable.
yes, raspberry pi4 4GB can be used as a desktop pc,have used it now for a month with my 32inch hd tv screen its good, have a cooler with fan and using kali linux full 64GB microSD card
Had to use it for 2 weeks as my mobo on my main pc died and had to RMA it, it wasn't bad at all I installed on it retropie and played some retro games even lol, but it really requires some tweaks for playing things such as netflix and other stuff on the browser itself.
a side note with a little learning curve you can install tmux and get multiple windows in one terminal though the hotkeys can be a pain to learn if your new to it
Not sure why, but Firefox has been shooting itself in the foot a lot, at least on Ubuntu. I've had to switch to chromium.
The pi 4B+ with 4GB isn't really suited for UA-cam, Facebook or online gaming. It's works best as a business system. this is mostly because the OS is a 32 bit operation system. Now the pi 4 B+ with 8GB is geared to run 64bits OS. This will help run modern day internet apps. But even it will have some issues with hard core gaming. When installing the standard Raspbian OS you have to make sure your installing the 64bit version.
I use it as my desktop pc in my mobile office.....
you can buy a different rasberry pi case for the pi4 that has a built in fan, they sell them through microcenter
good job, thanks
can you test obs recording from an external video source like console, pc etc can it be used as an cheap 720p streaming setup for twitch youtube
Video codecs matter. Your videos in HD seem to use VP9 (right click and check "stats for nerds". I think the pi only have h.264 acceleration as far as I know. Chromium probably does h.264 on recognizing the pi whereas firefox uses whatever it's given.
I like to add that Chromium on Ubuntu 19.10 with a AMD® Ryzen 7 1700 and 16Gb of ram, stills needs 5 seconds to start..
funny how a hand-sized pc it's better than my actual pc
Allocating 512 to gpu helps. Anything more doesn't help I'm told. But it helps. Needs a codec update and it'll be alot better
Not planning on using it as a desktop but I do wanna get one to play games. All the high temperature issue has let me down a bit but I hope it gets sorted out soon.
can we install a lightweight linux distro on raspberry pi something like peppermint Os or Lubuntu or Bodhi linux?
Raspberry Pi OS uses a modified LXDE
Yes I would like to do a particular project of having my garage door notify me when it’s open , to my phone thru home assistant, since I don’t have a computer anymore just a ipad , I was wondering if you could use a pi as a desktop.
you can also add the cpu temp applet to the desktop so you can see the cpu temperature in real time I also added the cpu usage applet so i can see if the cpu is maxed out. to add the cpu temperature applet right click on the task bar -> add/remove panel items -> add then select "cpu temperature monitor" and "cpu usage monitor" and click add.
Can you please check out if a 8GB RAM would be heating too much? If so, could you also check whether or not it is possible to add a heat sink and have decent temperature control?
i have raspi4 8gb and eweryday table computer, not good, slowly, hot, i has test many case and fan but alltime normal yutube video or movie try looking has hot, argon or many case test ad too hot alltime, first good cooler have now ice tower slim version and no hot, but no can use daily computer freeze softwares many many time/day need start again, all panel go no icture and then freeze all computer no move mouse etc, but can looking ad use raspi littletime/day. noty allday computer. i use genuine raspian. do same if owerlock or not.
Its works great with Raspain/Chromium. Using it now. Although NO DRM support for rights management. SO no Hulu, Netflix,UA-cam paid videos. There can never be a license because raspain is open source..so no responsible party...ever. Hacks are out there but...I havent found one yet.
Even on chromium? I use Linux and it works quite well on my desktop
@@rayssasoares836 Its actually default browser now in raspian... Works well enough on UA-cam. Ive only tested to 1080 windowed and full screen.
Can the Raspberry PI 4 be used as an everyday computer? Yes if you do lightweight activity. If you buy an used Lenovo thinkcentre M700 tiny form factor computer with an Intel I3 processor and 4-8 GB of Ram, you'll get more performance if you install Linux and do retro gaming
the reason youtube page is struggling is because of the VP9 codec, which the OS probably doesn't have native hardware support
i was usin Blender in my old mav book , but whith th new blender upgrade the specs of my lap is getting behind, could raspberry handle Blender , 360 fusion or any other 3d software?
Eu tenho meu raspberry pi 4 2GB e eu faço Sites e Apps nele e também vejo vídeos Full HD 60FPS ou 2K(com algumas travadas leves) sem overcloock e sem case.