Raspberry Pi sales limits lifted
Order as many as you want, but expect a long wait
Hardware hackers and ageing coders have snapped up more than 200,000 Linux running Raspberry Pi gadgets, the charity behind the cut-price computer said today.
And, in a far cry from the desperate struggle for kit following the Pi's launch in the Spring, the Raspberry Pi Foundation said its resale partners are no longer limiting orders to just one per customer.
"As of this morning, you’ll be able to buy as many Raspberry Pis as you want from both RS Components and Element 14," the Foundation said.
The organisation added that its contract manufacturers were now cooking up as many as 4000 Pis a day.
Yet there's still a hefty wait for your Pis. Element 14 was today saying: "Order today for expected delivery within 5 weeks." For RS, the lead time is a massive "11 weeks". Said RS: "We’re currently forecasting that these orders will start reaching customers by the end of September."
Both suppliers indicated they were still fulfilling existing orders "for the next few months".
Back in February, the initial batch of 10,000 Pis sold out within seconds of orders being accepted.
However, early manufacturing snafus - such a soldering on the wrong kind of Ethernet port - and the need to get CE certification for sale in Europe, helped ensure the £29 ARM-based motherboard didn't arrive in punters' hands until April. ®
COMMENTS
Re: Rubbish
If I wanted 1 GB of RAM and WiFi, I'd probably just buy a computer - I could get a dual-core 1.8GHz board for that kind of money (RAM and case extra), and it's got a decent video card to boot.
But that's not the point, is it? This is a hacker's board - buy two or three (or ten), and put them in all kinds of projects. Your garage door need a website? Now it has one. Your television need a mediacenter? Now it has one. You can need an on-board video and audio system? Now it has one.
It's not always about the best specs. Look at how well the Arduino has done - and it's quite paltry as compared to the Raspberry Pi, at least in terms of RAM and speed. No, this isn't a super-computer. If you were buying this in the hopes that it would replace your desktop, then you were either ill-informed or just largely ignorant.
But don't order one because of what I said - if you don't want one, don't get one. To each his own, and I'd rather there be more for me :-D
Re: Rubbish
The Raspberry Pi can run Debian. Why the hell would I want to pay *more* to have Ubuntu or Android?
Re: Rubbish
$117 plus shipping... Hmm depends what you want to do but since the Pi runs xbmc very well there is no advantage for me. Given the number of people developing for the Pi I'd expect support to be better in the long run - for example they are releasing a kernel using hard-float optimisation and ppl are working on gpu accelerated X.
Hmmm...
All versions out of stock apart from the "English" version at a $10 premium. Doesn't really bode well for future support does it? Nah, I think I'll order a Pi for < 50% of the price and enjoy the extra USB, Ethernet and GPIO connectivity thanks all the same.
Re: Rubbish - It is!
>>I got my MK802
Well go away and play with it, as well as your MK802
Just what is all this anger at the suprise popularity of this fruity named device.
The Raspbery Pi has done exactly what it set out to do, that is raise the profile of the computer and computer science in education, as collateral damage there have been thousands sold to enthusiasts, who will fill out all those tiny niches that a few hudred thousand enthusiasts will find. This will improve the educational offering, making it even more popular.
Please calm down, what's the problem, your toy not getting any press, well who cares, it's not as if the Pi is stealing your lunch now is it?
