The
Raspberry Pi is a credit-card-sized
single-board computer developed in the
UK by the
Raspberry Pi Foundation with the intention of promoting the teaching of basic
computer science in schools.
The Raspberry Pi is manufactured through licensed manufacturing deals with
Element 14/
Premier Farnell and
RS Components. Both of these companies sell the Raspberry Pi online.
The Raspberry Pi has a
Broadcom BCM2835
system on a chip (SoC), which includes an
ARM1176JZF-S processor (The firmware includes a number of "Turbo" modes so that the user can attempt overclocking, up to 1 GHz, without affecting the warranty),
VideoCore IV GPU, and was originally shipped with 256 megabytes of
RAM, later upgraded to 512MB. It does not include a built-in
hard disk or
solid-state drive, but uses an
SD card for booting and long-term storage. The Foundation's goal is to offer two versions, priced at US$25 and US$35. The Foundation started accepting orders for the higher priced model B on 29 February 2012, and the lower cost model A on 4 February 2013.
The Foundation provides Debian and Arch Linux ARM
distributions for download. Also planned are tools for supporting
Python as the main programming language, with support for
BBC BASIC, (via the
RISC OS image or the "Brandy Basic" clone for Linux),
C, and
Perl.
On 17 December 2012 the Raspberry Pi Foundation, in collaboration with IndieCity and Velocix, opened the "Pi Store", as a "one-stop shop for all your Raspberry Pi (software) needs". Using an application included in Raspbian, users can browse through several categories and download what they want. Software can also be uploaded for moderation and release.