The Raspberry Pi 400, released in 2020 was quite the curveball. Eschewing the established Raspberry Pi form factor for something that harks back to the 1980s home computer era. Orange Pi released its own alternative, the Orange Pi 800 and it seems that a recent update has increased the onboard eMMC from 64GB to 128GB for just an additional $9. Hat tip to CNX Software for spotting this.
| SoC | Rockchip RK3399 Six core CPU | Row 0 - Cell 2 |
| Row 1 - Cell 0 | 2 x Arm Cortex A72 cores up to 1.8 GHz | Row 1 - Cell 2 |
| Row 2 - Cell 0 | 4 x Arm Cortex A53 cores up to 1.4 GHz | Row 2 - Cell 2 |
| RAM | 4GB LPDDR4 | Row 3 - Cell 2 |
| Storage | 64GB or 128GB eMMC | Row 4 - Cell 2 |
| Ports | HDMI 2.0, VGA | Row 5 - Cell 2 |
| Row 6 - Cell 0 | 2 x USB 3, 1 x USB 2 | Row 6 - Cell 2 |
| Row 7 - Cell 0 | Gigabit Ethernet | Row 7 - Cell 2 |
| Row 8 - Cell 0 | 3.5mm Headphone jack | Row 8 - Cell 2 |
| Row 9 - Cell 0 | Integrated Speaker | Row 9 - Cell 2 |
| Row 10 - Cell 0 | Micro SD | Row 10 - Cell 2 |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth 5.0 LE | Row 11 - Cell 2 |
| GPIO | 26 pin | Row 12 - Cell 2 |
| Power | 5V / 4A via USB C | Row 13 - Cell 2 |
| Dimensions | 286 x 122 x 24 mm | Row 14 - Cell 2 |
The Raspberry Pi 400 and Orange Pi 800 are almost twins, save for a few different ports, and color scheme. Despite the shortages, the Raspberry Pi 400 has been relatively well stocked.
The original spec for the Orange Pi 800 saw 64GB of embedded eMMC storage, which provided ample space to install your choice of Linux OS. Orange Pi OS, Ubuntu, Debian and Manjaro being the main choices. The release of a 128GB model simply offers us more space for our projects. There are no other spec bumps. We still have the RK3399 SoC with a competent six core CPU (2 x Arm A72 and 4 x Arm A53) and 4GB of LPDDR4 RAM. The addition of eMMC makes the Orange Pi 800 an interesting Raspberry Pi alternative.
The Raspberry Pi 400 is essentially a 4GB Raspberry Pi 4 in a keyboard chassis. Harking back to the 1980s home computer era, where wedge keyboards such as the Commodore 64 and Amiga were commonplace. The Raspberry Pi 400 uses the same SoC as the Pi 4, but came pre-overclocked to 1.8GHz, thanks to a firmware update this same overclock became the norm for Pi 4. On paper the Orange Pi 800 has more cores and the same 1.8GHz top speed, add to this the eMMC (something the Raspberry Pi 400 lacks) and you've got a decent SBC / home computer for $108.
GPIO access for the Raspberry Pi 400 and Orange Pi 800 is a little more awkward. The former requiring a breakout board such as Pimoroni's Flat HAT Hacker for use with HATs. The latter featuring only 26 GPIO pins (just like the original Raspberry Pi).
No matter what specs, with SBCs it boils down to software support, and this is where the Raspberry Pi always wins. GPIO, Python and general OS features are consistently better on the Raspberry Pi than on any other SBC.
The Orange Pi 800 128GB can be found on Aliexpress for $108.
