The Raspberry Pi Foundation's new Raspberry Pi 2 is touted as having six times the processing power of its predecessor and twice the main memory size. However, it will still be retailed at only $35 and will carry the same size of a credit card.
It was in 2012 when the company launched the original Raspberry Pi microcomputer, which was designed as a cheaper alternative PC for schools, hobbyists and computer tinkerers.
More than 4.5 million units of the micro PC had reportedly been sold as it gained approval from consumers who had the misconception that computers were expensive. The newly released version is said to have a 100 percent code compatibility with the original.
"We know that you have been eager to get your hands on the next incarnation of the Pi for some time, and we can't wait to see what clever hacks you'll show off at our third birthday party later this month," wrote founder Eben Upton of the Raspberry Pi Foundation in a blog post.
The Raspberry Pi 2 has a processor with four ARM Cortex-A7 cores that run at 900MHz. Previously, the original Raspberry Pi's BCM2835 chip had a single ARM core. The latest version is also designed with 1GB RAM.
"What we've been able to do with Pi 2 is go from a single ARM 11 Core, which is a fairly antique processor now, to a quad core ARM Cortex A7," said Upton. He added that the processor is akin to a modern top of the line processor that increases the processing capacity of the Raspberry Pi 1 by up to six times.
The appearance of the new version is slightly altered. The new version now has four USB ports compared to the older version's two. It also has more GPIO pins and a slot for the MicroSD card instead of the SD.
The number "2" in the Raspberry Pi 2 moniker means that the model has an upgraded CPU and memory. This is to set it apart from the Model B+ version, which had the same processor as the original version that was released back in 2012.
"So Pi 2 resolves, pretty much, all of the remaining issues that people had with Pi -- and those are mostly around memory and processing capability," added Upton.
