The Banana Pi BPI-F5 is a brand new SBC (single-board computer) that packs an octa-core ARM SoC, a decent NPU, 40-pin GPIO header and plenty of connectivity in a credit-card sized board. A pretty decent Raspberry Pi alternative, the SBC is intended for industrial and hobbyist use.
One the one hand, an 8 core ARM chip with all E cores interests me from a “maybe this can be passively cooled, but have enough horsepower to be useful” standpoint.
On the other hand, looks like it’s made on a 22nm process, so while cost will hopefully be low, power savings will be limited.
On the third hand, the A55 is a 2017 core, and I’m getting really tired of ARM’s strategy of dribbling out designs at an absolutely glacial pace to the lower end of the market.
All interesting points.
I suppose the use-case for stuff like this is always-on devices that have requirements for intermittent (and short) periods of max performance.