A significantly cheaper Raspberry Pi 4 is coming to the market

The world of compact computers is enriched with a new, more affordable version of the popular Raspberry Pi 4 Model B. Although the novelty brings a noticeably lower price compared to the standard versions, it hides an important hardware change. The computer is equipped with the so-called "binned" Broadcom BCM2711 chip. These are processors that did not meet the highest quality criteria for full speed operation during production, so they operate at lower clock speeds, but are still stable.

According to Cytron, these processors come directly from the Raspberry Pi parent company, but they simply don't meet the requirements to achieve the top-end specifications and 1.8 GHz clock speed. Instead, they are factory-tuned to operate smoothly and reliably at up to 1.25 GHz. This reduced speed shouldn't be a major obstacle for most everyday projects and basic applications. In practice, the device will only be slightly slower than the standard unit, but the difference will be noticeable when running synthetic performance tests and under more demanding processor loads.

Despite the experimental taste of buying a lower-performance processor, the offer is extremely attractive from a cost perspective. There are two system configurations available. The version with 4 GB of RAM is available for around 80 euros, while the standard model with the same amount of memory costs around 101 euros from the same retailer.

For those who need more space for data, there is a version with 8 GB of memory, which costs around 135 euros in this special edition, while the full standard version requires paying around 166 euros.