Raspberry Pi 3 with WiFi and Bluetooth comes out

The Raspberry Pi foundation has announced version three Model B of the small Pi computer. Raspberry Pi 3 Model B includes a 64-bit quad-core and support for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, while the form factor and price have remained the same compared to the Pi 2.

The Raspberry Pi 3 processor offers ten times the processing power of the Raspberry Pi 1, and the increase over the Raspberry Pi 2 would be about 50 to 60 percent, claims the foundation, which measured the results with Sysbench. The Pi 3 has a BCM2837, a chip from Broadcom with a clock speed of 1.2GHz, support for 64bit and four cores based on ARM’s Cortex A53. Basically, the architecture of the soc is not much different from that of the chips of its predecessors, which guarantees compatibility with the Pi 1 and 2.

Also new is the presence of the BCM43438: a chip that brings support for 802.11n WiFi and Bluetooth 4.1 to the Pi 3. Despite this addition, the form factor has hardly changed. “The only change is the position of the LEDs, which have moved to the other side of the SD card socket to make room for the antenna,” reports the Raspberry Pi foundation. Compute Module 3 versions with BCM2837-soc should be released in the coming months. Information about the Pi 3 already came out on Saturday.

The connections are in the same places as with the Raspberry Pi 2. If you hang USB accessories on the mini computer, it is better to use a 2.5A power supply, is the advice for the new Pi. The foundation continues to provide the older versions alongside the new ones. The suggested retail price of the Pi 3 is $35, the same as that for the Pi 2, which will therefore not receive a price reduction for the time being. The A+ model remains a cheaper entry-level model with a price of 20 dollars and the foundation expects to produce a ‘Model A’ variant of the Raspberry Pi 3 later in 2016.