Last year Raspberry Pi launched the Raspberry Pi 500 for taking their Raspberry Pi keyboard computer into the Raspberry Pi 5 world. Today they are announcing the Raspberry Pi 500+ as an upgraded version of the device now with a mechanical keyboard, LED lighting, 16GB of RAM, and NVMe SSD storage.
The Raspberry Pi 400 and Raspberry Pi 500 keyboard computers were very innovative devices albeit limited by their microSD storage and 8GB of memory capacity. With today’s launch of the Raspberry Pi 500+ it’s now a much more capable device for daily use with a nicer mechanical keyboard, 16GB of RAM being much more appropriate as a minimum for today’s computing environment, and NVMe SSD storage for better performance and longevity than microSD storage.
Raspberry Pi kindly sent over a review sample of the Raspberry Pi 500+ in advance of today’s announcement. I have been testing out the Raspberry Pi 500+ in a number of performance benchmarks the past few days and using the device to good success. It’s a solid device and feels much more well rounded now than the Raspberry Pi 400/500. The keyboard is a delight to use and the 16GB of RAM and NVMe storage making it much more appropriate for more use-cases.
The Raspberry Pi 500+ though is launching at $200 USD, which is a significant premium over the Raspberry Pi 500 at $90 USD. But it’s better quality and much more capable, but past the $100 price point for those hoping it would somehow be another budget computer. But even still for $200 you are getting a device with a lot of computing potential and nicer quality.
