Pi3+ - worth upgrading to?

mauro123

I guess there's no improvement in shaders performance as well with the new model, because shaders are supposed to be handled mostly at GPU level. Anyone can refute this argument?

sirhenrythe5th

Will get one soon.
For me as a die Hard MAME Fan, 200MHz plus will help a lot! 😊

Ecks

@schmulkfuster said in Pi3+ - worth upgrading to?:

I was watching Pimoroni's Bilge Tank this morning and they mentioned that it runs cooler than the original Pi3 so that could be a potential upside (if it runs cooler, you're less likely to suffer from throttling).

The new one can do more despite being the same kind of processor because it doesn't get as hot. This is mostly because there is some metal on it that wasn't on the old one, which pulls heat away from the processor so it can work faster. Just like when it's hot you don't feel like doing much, processors also work better when they're cool.

From: http://blog.pimoroni.com/straightforward-guide-to-whats-new/

Well the CPU does have a heat spread on it this time which does lower the temps but for me i still would rely on using my dual fan on it.

drake999

I would say no, at least for me personally. I'm already running Pi3 boards at 1350 MHz, so no need for 50 more MHz. If it turned out to be highly overclockable, then I might reconsider, but I suspect that is not the case. Aside from the nice addition of a dual-band WiFi radio and a slightly better NIC, they are basically the same as the original Pi3 (when it is overclocked). I will wait for Pi4 before I upgrade.

dirthurts

My pi doesn't overlcock at all ( think I managed a 15 mhz cpu boost). So the extra few hundred mhz will really help with knocking down the SNES control lag that pops up (assuming this is the CPU causing the issue but maybe the updated bluetooth will help too).
If I can get an extra 100 mhz out of it over the 3.4 N64 games might be mostly playable.

Bobberella

I could tell you my setting if you want to but i broke all of the warranty. You also need a fan.

Apparently, the raspberry pi designed for 1.4 Ghz and then they lowered it to 1.2 Ghz to get rid of a heat issue.

I dont think the 3B+ pi can be overclocked... it would be nice to get rid of the fan situation. And I dont need to break any of the warrenty.

quicksilver

@bobberella said in Pi3+ - worth upgrading to?:

I dont think the 3B+ pi can be overclocked

I'm sure youll be able to overclock it. How much it will take is a different story.

PiBoy

@quicksilver

Probably the same amount as the original 3B. The 3B+ has the same CPU, it just hasn't been throttled for the sake of temperature like the 3B. The RPi 3B with a heatsink and fan should have the exact same overclock potential as the 3B+ with a heatsink and fan.

quicksilver

@piboy I think you are a little off base. Most pi 3s will not Overclock to 1.4ghz. Mine will just make it to 1.35ghz and be stable, past that and I will get crashing and other issues. Heat isn't the main issue when it comes to stability.

tikiandskull

i reed that in the recalbox forum by a man named "gkralicek2"

"Overclock works fine with new pi 3 B+ (i tested it briefly this afternoon with raspbian). I managed to achieve a 200 Mhz bump (from stock 1.4 Ghz to 1.6Ghz) without any problem on all of the 10 unit we got for test in the lab where i work. Idle temperature at 1.4Ghz is somewhere around 56-58 celsius and it climbs up to 68-70 once overclocked @1.6Ghz (which turns out to be closer to 78 degrees once a few stress tests are executed). Much better than the results i got with the original Pi 3 with copper heatsink when overclocked from 1.2 to 1.5 (which was slightly above 80 Celsius at times hence provoking random freezes).

I'll try to do some more tests if i got spare time during the next few days trying to get close to 1.7 Ghz if possible (but as far as 1.6 gets me close to 80 degrees i'm afraid pushing more will end up in random freezes)"

grant2258

@tikiandskull said in Pi3+ - worth upgrading to?:

i reed that in the recalbox forum by a man named "gkralicek2"

"Overclock works fine with new pi 3 B+ (i tested it briefly this afternoon with raspbian). I managed to achieve a 200 Mhz bump (from stock 1.4 Ghz to 1.6Ghz) without any problem on all of the 10 unit we got for test in the lab where i work. Idle temperature at 1.4Ghz is somewhere around 56-58 celsius and it climbs up to 68-70 once overclocked @1.6Ghz (which turns out to be closer to 78 degrees once a few stress tests are executed). Much better than the results i got with the original Pi 3 with copper heatsink when overclocked from 1.2 to 1.5 (which was slightly above 80 Celsius at times hence provoking random freezes).

I'll try to do some more tests if i got spare time during the next few days trying to get close to 1.7 Ghz if possible (but as far as 1.6 gets me close to 80 degrees i'm afraid pushing more will end up in random freezes)"

This sound like its time for me to update my pi 2 a pi 3 wasnt worth it the extra networking + the extra speed justifies it for me if i was on a pi 3 i wouldnt do it to be fair

kikinaak

Makes me wonder how well it would perform if a sink was added to the spreader. Or if the flirc case gets a redesign to fit it.

matchaman

In my opinion it's worth the upgrade considering the low price of the device but only if you're running lr-snes9x, lr-pcsx-rearmed and lr-mupen64plus.

Overcloking my 3 model to 1.4GHz decreased some slowdown problems of the above RA cores (especially sound clicking issues with lr-snes9x/lr-snes9x2010) but I have to use copper heatsinks and a little fan.

I believe that the stock clock of the B+ model will eliminate the need for any kind of cooling parts while the 200MHz boost seems to be quite useful for the aforementioned optimisations.

BobHarris

@matchaman Did you only overclock the cpu when you saw the improvements in these cores?

Jono

@drake999 ETA Prime posted some benchmarks today, he got the 3+ to go to 1550Mhz, and he clocked the GPU to 500Mhz. He said there was no noticable improvement in games, a slight improvement but GPU is the bottlenext at the moment.

sirhenrythe5th

@jono spoken for what kind of games?
Sounds like Dreamcast, N64 & Co.
Concerning MAME an Upgrade of 350MHz will be more significant.

hooperre

I feel like I'm reading conflicting things regarding power consumption of the Pi 3b+. I (think) I've read that it runs at a higher Mhz with higher power consumption and cooler temps? Is this correct? Can someone possibly ELI5? Would I need a new power supply other than a 5V 2.5 A supply? Thanks!

Edit: This power consumption article was just posted on another thread.

matchaman

@bobharris yes, only the CPU OC helped to eliminate the lr-snes9x/2010 clicking

Jono

@sirhenrythe5th sorry for not getting back sooner. You're right, he was talking graphically intensive games such as Dreamcast and N64.

ClassicGMR

Well I can't really recommend spending the money as an UPGRADE. However if you're going to buy a Pi soon anyway go for this one. Here's my $0.02:

First off I have never O/C'd the 3B and I am not doing it to the 3B+ either so stock 1.2GHz and 1.4GHz respectively. The RAM is the same at 1GB and the GPU is the same as well.

Right out of the gate: I guess a small 200MHz increase can make a difference. :)

Boot times (started timer as soon as I pushed the power button):
3B+
32GB card and RetroPie 4.3.15 image only - 24sec
32GB card and 256GB USB (90GB used) - 1min 45sec

3B
32GB card and RetroPie 4.3 image only - 25sec
32GB card and 256GB USB (90GB used) - 2min 4sec

PS1 Destruction Derby 2 and Gran Turismo 2 ran flawlessly as long as you didn't use vibration feedback. On the 3B I would get a frame hesitation here and there - extremely minor almost not worth mentioning. On the 3B+ there was nothing TO mention. I saw nothing in multiple races. Smooth running. :)

The scraper did MUCH better on the 3B+. Last time I set up I used the built-in scraper from the menu and scraped 41 Playstation games. I watched an episode of Friends on Netflix and started a 2nd before I finished. On the 3B+ I did all of them in 5min 27sec. The WiFi is vastly improved on the 3B+ and it shows.

PING yahoo.com on 3B: avg 65.405 ms with 20 packets sent 0% loss
PING yahoo.com on 3B+: avg 32.190 ms with 21 packets sent 0% loss

On a personal note I have 2 PS3 controllers - one white and one black. I already paired the black one with the 3B. I left that alone and paired the white one with the 3B+. Nice to have and easily differentiated!