Raspberry Pi4 Speculation

quicksilver

Now that its officially 2019 and potentially is the release year for the raspberry pi 4, I thought it would be fun to speculate on what that might mean to us Retropie users. Obviously we know absolutely nothing about the specs or release date but if we assume that there is a significant performance upgrade to the CPU/GPU and perhaps gles3 capable could we finally have relatively smooth N64 and dreamcast emulation on the pi? What other new emulators could potentially become viable on a pi4? I know that there is a Saturn emulator that works well for mobile (Yaba Sanshiro), could this ever make its way to Retropie if the pi4 has the right specs?

I also wanted to share this post by "jamesh" who is a raspberry pi engineer and forum moderator on the official raspberry pi forum:

"Everything we have done so far has evolved the original design. I know the specs of the Pi4. It's not an evolution, it's a revolution and a HUGE step up.

Don't think it has EMMC though, but I will check. I doubt there is enough demand to take the hit in cost. It also seems likely there isn't enough board space to actually fit it. Hard enough cramming eveything is as things stand now."

His statement is vague but exciting! The fact that he knows what the specs are also seems to signify that the board is probably in production and not still in the design phase (just my guess).

link to the source https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=63&t=229768&sid=6a2f4b088cf0d8000a145204a94eec36&start=25

A Former User

I would like.

ARM Cortex-A76 - Hey, one can dream - ;-)
Dedicated Video chip - Mali V76.
2Gb RAM, minimum.
512Mb - 1Gb Dedicated Video ram - no more sharing of ram.
USB 3.0
SATA connection
Backwards compatible GPIO Header.

quicksilver

@John_RM_70 Wont be a mali GPU. Raspberry pi uses broadcom videocore. So likely will be called videocore 5 or something like that.

A Former User

@quicksilver Oh, I agree. My list is more of a dream list, rather than a wish list.

thelostsoul

I wouldn't mind if the starting price would be higher than the previous entries. The previous cpu was "Broadcom BCM2837B0 VideoCore IV" and "Cortex-A53 (ARMv8) 64-bit SoC @ 1.4GHz". Wikipedia page about VideoCore: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VideoCore

Spec:

CPU: Cortex-A75 (ARMv8-A) 64-bit SoC @ 2.8GHz
SOC: BCM7251
GPU: VideoCore V (500Mhz? compared to 400Mhz on Pi3)
16GB fast internal space
DDR3 2GB RAM (compared to DDR2 1GB)

Connections:

4K/60Hz HDMI output (or dual 1080p/60Hz output)
2 x USB 2.0 Type A (our current for legacy)
2 x USB 3.2 Type C (the smaller new type)
1 x SATA revision 3.0 (6 Gbit/s) (probably not)
onboard power and reset switch (probably not)
dedicated RCA Composite Video output (probably not)

50 $/€ initial price tag (instead 35 of the previous). Ok, this is more like a wishlist. I even don't know if these cpu and gpu and soc would work together and if this is realistic in that price point. But hey, I expect groundbreaking changes without compatible with older version.

quicksilver

@thelostsoul I think they have confirmed it's going to be roughly at the same price point as previous models. If you browse the raspberry pi forums you can find comments from the engineers that give subtle hints about what may or may not be part of the next generation of pi. One comment I saw said they even have a rough idea what the pi5 will look like.

herb_fargus

I'm really hoping they release in February as they usually do. Cause I'm impatient. Obviously the biggest hope when it comes to emulation is faster processer/better GPU. I'd imagine it would have at least 2 GB of ram

quicksilver

@herb_fargus I'm hoping for a February release as well. Looking at past release dates, the vast majority were in February so hopefully they stick with that schedule.

A Former User

@quicksilver I don't get why they want the same pricing. Why not go for a Tiered pricing within a range of Pi machines ? High-end = Pi 4B+, mid range = 3B+, low-end = Pi Zero....etc... I would gladly, as probably would a lot, pay for a premium 4B+ model double the current price, IF it had good specs and plenty of RAM.

thelostsoul

@John_RM_70 I wonder also the exact same thing. I don't get it, there would be so many people wanting that I assume. That would catch all the higher priced alternatives. Here the lineup how they are currently compared to what I wish Pi 4 would be. I think it would fit perfectly. Even if the Pi 4 had a price point of 35 dollars, it would be much better than last entry, as it does not try to be compatible. Combine that with a higher price and higher performance.

Pi 4B = high end with lot of features and performance for enthusiast (50 dollars)
Pi 3B+ = recommended main entry for most (35 dollars)
Pi 3A+ = same features and performance as 3B+, but smaller with less connections (25 dollars)
Pi Zero W = ultra compact form factor, limited features and weak (10 dollars)

quicksilver

@John_RM_70 I'm curious myself. You should post that on the official raspberry pi forums. The mods/engineers seem very active there. I'd be curious what they had to say about it.

A Former User

It would be good to get a official response on why they want to keep with the norm, at least we would know the official direction they want to go. Although, I doubt they'll answer any questions until a product announcement is made.
Still, I think it's safe to say that "something" is going to be released this year.

Duro

TechRepublic just posted a new interview with Upton that says the Pi4 isn't coming until 2020-2021 and will feature a whole new system on a chip.

Duro

@Duro Here is a link to the article: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/inside-the-raspberry-pi-the-story-of-the-35-computer-that-changed-the-world/

thelostsoul

@Duro I remember that I read this article. Maybe it does not come out yet, don't plan anything.

Upton says the ambition is to release the board in the 2020-2021 timeframe.

quicksilver

@Duro let's hope it's a misprint ;)

mitu

Maybe Upton is just trolling...

A Former User

Yeah, I remember Upton doing a few interviews back in 2017, and he said they were looking at a 2019 release for the Pi 4.
So, like Mitu said, he's either trolling, or they've hit some problems.