There is no doubt that the Raspberry Pi 4 is a resounding success, not only is it demonstrated by the enormous number of applications it has, but also the fact that the demand for it is so great that it is not only almost impossible to find one, but also its price has risen to stratospheric levels. That is why they have become extremely interesting alternatives like the Orange Pi 5. What does this SBC offer us?
One of the most common complaints towards the Raspberry Pi 4 is the lack of power for certain applications, however, the fifth generation of the famous board does not arrive due to the fact that the company in charge of manufacturing them lives a golden age caused by the shortage of components. What causes there to be less supply than demand, raises prices and as a final consequence the benefits on the Raspberry Pi have risen. There is no motivation for a Pi 5 with a user cost that has increased four or even five times.
What is the Orange Pi 5?
It is a Single Board Computer or computer on a single board, so it is part of the same family of devices as the Raspberry Pi against which it competes and is presented as an alternative to them. Its main feature? The components of its circuitry are much better and reach a much higher power level than the Raspberry Pi 4, to the point that it has a computing power several times higher in each and every one of its components, and this shows in the fact that the Orange Pi 5 can run applications with ease that for the Pi 4 are an ordeal.
| Raspberry Pi 4 (Model B) | Orange Pi 5 | |
|---|---|---|
| main chip | Broadcom BCM2171 | Rockchip RK3588S |
| CPU cores | 4 x Cortex A72 at 1.8GHz | 4 x Cortex A76 at 2.4 GHz +4 x Cortex A55 both at 2.4 GHz |
| RAM Type | LPDDR4-3200 | LPDDR4X-4266 |
| RAM configurations | 1GB, 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB | 4, 8, and 16 GB. |
| Graphic processor | Broadcom VideoCore VI @ 0.5 GHz | Mali-G610 MP4 |
| NPU | No | Integrated with 6 power TOPS |
| M.2 port | No | Yes, PCIe Gen 2 x1 |
| GPIO | 40 pin | 28 pin |
One of its greatest qualities regarding hardware is that it has an M.2 connector that allows us to install a Wifi+Bluetooth adapter, however, we can choose to install an NVMe SSD. The bad part? Its bandwidth corresponds to a PCI Express 2.0 with a single line, whose bandwidth speed is not higher than a SATA interface, but results in a system like this in a performance improvement compared to running the operating system from the MicroSD card .
Pros and cons of the Orange Pi 5 compared to the Raspberry Pi 4
The fact is that if we want to use it as an alternative to Rasbperry PI in projects that do not imply having to tinker with other devices that have to interact with the SBC, then we will not have problems using it. We are referring to simple applications such as creating a small PC for office tasks, an emulation machine for old consoles, a desktop system based on Android or a NAS server, among many other examples that come to mind.
All this with a much higher performance, so if you can’t buy a Pi 4, then this Orange Pi 5 is a more than solid alternative, what’s more, it should become the main option considering the capabilities of this hardware with respect to the SBC more popular.
However, there are a number of differential elements that can make it worse in some cases.
- It is larger in size and therefore the huge number of boxes for the Raspberry Pi 4 are not compatible as they are too small. And things get worse if we use an 80 mm long M.2 SSD
- The power of the Orange Pi 5, being higher, also transmits more heat and therefore active dissipation is recommended, that is, the use of fans to keep the SBC cool.
- Keep in mind that power supplies for the Pi 4 don’t work, but anything based on USB-C will do just fine.
- It has fewer pins on its GPIO connector, although this does not affect all uses, keep this in mind if you need to create a project that requires all or almost all of the pins on a Pi 4.
Price and availability
Its price is low and it is compared to the current Rasbperry Pi 4, but if we then take into account the relationship between price and power, then it is clear that it is much fairer. We have seen a kit for €192 on AliExpress that contains not only the board with 16 GB of memory but also all the necessary elements for its use.
