“I was a bit apprehensive about dropping nearly £200 on a Pi but the 500+ justifies its price from feel alone. It has more heft than the 400 and the keys feel solid (they look like double shot plastic so the coloured lights shine through the characters - a nice premium touch!). You also get the most RAM ever in a Pi (16 GB - more than most budget laptops) and a high quality Raspberry Pi 256 GB SSD pre-loaded with the operating system so it works as soon as it's plugged in. I could take or leave the clicky switches, but the rest of the machine is good enough for them not to be too much of a pain point.
Haven't tried any big code projects on it yet but the performance so far is snappy, only really slowing down when a large number of browser tabs are open.
My box didn't come with the tools for opening the computer or swapping the keycaps but, after a couple of emails back and forth with support, they are going to post out a spare set. Very happy indeed :-)”
“Brilliant home computer. Easy to use and fast. Just plug in to a HDMI display, a mouse and a suitable power supply (27W recommended) and it will boot from its built in SSD. You need to answer a few questions to set up your user account and you are away. 16Gb of memory is more than enough for most home users. The 256Gb disc might seem small but who stores everything locally these days?. It boots in seconds. I got around 100mbps in both directions over wi-fi but using a wired connection I hit the full 900mbps downstream speed my ISP delivers. The illuminated keyboard is fun and I like the noisy keys. The illumination is adjustable using a function key combination, as is the volume of the audio output through the HDMI connection. This is the best thought out computer design that I have ever encountered!”
“At last! What the original Pi500 should have been - a true desktop workhorse with NVMe storage. I like the keyboard, and it's nice to have the lighting (although I'm sure the novelty will wear off soon) but TBH I would have been happy with the previous Pi500 keyboard. But the key(sic) feature is of course the fast NVMe boot and storage capacity. it comes pre-installed with a fast and reliable RPi branded drive, so no issues with compatibility. The extra memory is also helpful for desktop use. I now have a Pi desktop as well as all the little pis around the house :-)”
“This isn't the first Pi product I own, nor will it be the last. Right now, This goes to 11! with this iteration of Pi, IMO. The mechanical keyboard will take a little getting used to, but it does feel a pleasure to type on. There is a proper sense of weight to the Pi 500+, of course, because of the mechanical keyboard. Performance is great too. My go to test is UT99, installed from PiKiss. Happy days!! The SSD that was installed was a Raspberry Pi branded 2280, that has been swapped out for something of higher capacity, that I already had on hand and, I've added and RTC battery, as well as the new 45W PSU.
This is a very niche product, reflected in the price. I think a lot of people, may avoid it. Next time round Raspberry Pi, add an external camera connector... extra ribbon cables don't bother me. Oh and it would have been nice, if the SSD connector, was accessible, via an underside trap door! Tho I digress, I'm not an electronics engineer. Excellent service from The Pi Hut, as I've always had. Ordered on a Sunday, delivered by Tuesday.
All in all, the Pi 500+ will serve my daily computing needs very, very well, for as long as it lasts.”
