What's better, Pi, Beaglebone, or Other?

My recent ARM embedded experiences have included Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoards, and Gumstix.

Well the Gumstix I used got insanely hot, had just about zero package support and was so micro-sized that hooking up anything to it was sort of a pain.

Both the Pi and the BBB have different, but sufficient peripherals and methods to hook stuff up.

My big knock with the Pi is the manufacture of it.

We're an embedded house. If we were to turn out a next generation, beyond a prototype, we'd not ship Pi boards, we'd reproduce the design, cut away the junk we don't use, and ship it like that. Well, the Pi is not really "copy manufacturable" because of that cute way they decided to sandwich the peripheral interface chip with the processor. Not sure the Pi has any embedded MMC or that of any consequence.

The BBB is more reproducible, does have MMC as well as a set of schematics and gerbers available so you can copy it and modify the design so as to make it fit for your particular design, plus you can then set up a real manufacturing chain that suits your product versus rely on their supply chain as well as the revisions of their HW/SW.

All these experimentations started because we've migrated from ATOM SOM solutions to ARM ones. And we started with ARM, but via Fingerboards and other solutions, just that the former ARM Linux's were lacking in top level features. That's different today, so it is beneficial to start putting out designs based on Pi or BBB, or other.

I wonder what levels of success along these lines others have had and what your thoughts are respective to actually using ARM and Linux within a true product and not just quick prototypes or personal experimentations.

Anyone wish to share some thoughts?

Hi,

Each device was designed for different markets. Rpi was developed to serve a education venue; From http://www.raspberrypi.org/

The Raspberry Pi is a low cost, credit-card sized computer that plugs into a computer monitor or TV, and uses a standard keyboard and mouse. It is a capable little device that enables people of all ages to explore computing, and to learn how to program in languages like Scratch and Python. It’s capable of doing everything you’d expect a desktop computer to do, from browsing the internet and playing high-definition video, to making spreadsheets, word-processing, and playing games. What’s more, the Raspberry Pi has the ability to interact with the outside world, and has been used in a wide array of digital maker projects, from music machines and parent detectors to weather stations and tweeting birdhouses with infra-red cameras. We want to see the Raspberry Pi being used by kids all over the world to learn to program and understand how computers work.

While the Beagle-boards were designed along the line for development/design/experimenter/hobbyist; From http://beagleboard.org/

BeagleBone Black A true open hardware, community-supported embedded computer for developers and hobbyists. Ride the 1GHz edge with the Sitara™ ARM® Cortex-A8 processor, boot Linux in under 10 seconds and get started on development in less than 5 minutes with just a single USB cable. Key Features: 1GHz performance Run Ubuntu & Android uHDMI, uSD, USB, Ethernet, 5V Built-in 4GB storage with Debian

I really feel that both can be educational and provide the means to open the digital world to someone that has the desire to learn about ARM or computing in general since each provides good tools to support their specific boards. The Rpi provides for a broad educational base at reduced cost for a world community. Plus the Rpi does allow one to use Arduino to expand ones developments/designs needs to simplify the projects. Digitizing a analog world can be fun.
Have fun & enjoy!

More bang for your buck maybe? Classified under other?

http://ameridroid.com/

Looks like mmc drive is modular replaceable and can use SD or mmc.