A new 3GB Raspberry Pi 4 for $83.75, and more memory-driven price increases - Raspberry Pi https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/a-new-3gb-raspberry-pi-4-for-83-75-and-more-memory-driven-price-increases/
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Here’s what I noticed that I thought was interesting. from the news post https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/a-new-3gb-raspberry-pi-4-for-83-75-and-more-memory-driven-price-increases/
“The products affected by today’s price rises are Raspberry Pi 4 and 5 variants with 4GB or more of memory;”
Zynthian can still run on 1GB, unless you want to use the larger sfz or sf2 files. The £50 pi 5 is still an option and will run Surge-XT.
They also point out “we don’t anticipate any price rises for our classic products, including Raspberry Pi Zero, Zero W and Zero 2 W; Raspberry Pi 1, 3, 3B+, and 3A+; and Compute Module 1 and 3+. These products use older LPDDR2 DRAM, of which we currently hold substantial inventory.”
Maybe for people who are struggling to source a 1GB pi 5, a curated synth experience for the pi3 & pi4 could be developed? Some engines would be omitted, but there’s plenty that would still work.
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The new clippy audio clip launcher does benefit from the extra memory and is unlikely to perform well (or maybe at all) with a reduced RAM.
However we may see it, the current RAM and SSD shortage, with related price spikes, is a sad predicament for the whole IT sector. We come from approximately a decade/fifteen years of steady and robust technological expansion at affordable rates, which has largely benefited the mid-low access levels of computer gear, affording experimental, embedded and DIY projects an unprecedented degree of CPU power and mass-storage efficiency, both in terms of quantity and quality (speed and reliability).
The Raspberry enterprise and the Zynthian project itself wouldn’t simply have been conceivable, without the availablity of high silicon efficiency at mass prices. The entire music technology sector, a relatively small industry with lesser levers of negotiation, will suffer from this state of things beyond the passage of the worst market wave. The definite and substantial development direction imparted to the Zynthian ecosystem, during the last year or so - with structural integration of powerful emulators and romplers, the revised launcher/song manager, amp and impulse reverb simulators, added sophisticated FX and extended looping capabilities -, is turning the project into a full-fledged and unusually powerful stand-alone music workstation. But sustaining this current trend of technological progression of the Zynth, even prospectively towards what one day will be the V6, requires and will require strong CPU capabilities and fast abundant RAM and storage (nvme) facilities. Of course, not every application dictates top-notch specs, and it is completely possible to right-size resources in light of the expected goals, without wasting on useless overhead, but the overall trend is clear, and the path is drawn.
Best to all 
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BRB, selling a kidney for Clippy audio clip launcher.
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Im finding much pleasure and similar early vibes and projects with the pi pico 2w…
The pi itself will become interesting again once i think in terms of buying one for a project and getting a second to save on the postage and packing….
Its not been helped by the considerable low level changes the pi5 seemd to have introduced. Outside of clippy there is a big numbers are best approach that tends to be the terrirory of advertisers rather than considered design.
Still over here advocating that the Zynthian project recentre itself on an MCU platform which can connect to any computer.
RPi is a liability at this point, vis-a-vis what we - musicians using FOSS synths and DSPs - need. It has been a great boon to those of us who want to get into this, but this project, given things like the Access Virus firmwares becoming available, has outgrown its constrained little world. IMO.
I am somewhat kicking myself. I ordered an 8xout-8xin Audio interface, thinking I had a spare Pi5 in my project box. Turns out I was wrong, it was a Pi4 with an Octo 6xin-8xout (which is a dead project). And now the cost of a new Pi5 16Gb or 8Gb is so excessive I can’t really justify the spend.
There doesn’t seem to be any possibility of accessing the GPIO pins on my Zynthian 5.1, so I have cool hardware that is sitting idle at the moment. I do have a bunch of multi-socket balanced to unbalanced input boards and unbalanced to XLR output boards, so I’ll have to devote time to putting all that into a case with power, so that I can eventually put everything together.
This sucks, but I believe it’s temporary. Warning, though, my crystal ball is known to be unreliable.
Generally, though, industry catches up with spikes in demand, and it often even leads to cost reductions later, once industry is geared up. Also, while currently the AI boom is affecting 4G memories, I suspect that soon 4G just won’t be big enough to be useful (and hopefully 8G too.)
I noticed this just recently myself. I’d been working on a Pi4 video controller project for my son when introduced me to RPi, and which led me to discover Zynthian. I’d put a Pi5 in my Amazon basket, until I was ready to jump into Zynth. When it came time to pull the trigger I was surprised to see the price jumps, but fortunately there was still some 4G units in the pipeline at older prices, so I got one for about $80. Now I see even 2G Pi5’s are over $90! Sigh.
But I do think this is temporary. Or perhaps it’s just wishful thinking?
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It can be treated as an opportunity to take stock.
This community no longer has the Pi3 attitude where you wondered if you should buy two or three of them?, and we got an awful lot of R&D done under those conditions.
I’ve got two Pi5’s . One running my desktop (8G) bought as soon as they appeared, and the CM5 module in my Argon Pi laptop.
I could, probably, and sensibly upgrade my Pi4 machines, Cajon, Rack, Pedalboard, to Pi 5 and retire the Pi4’s to home automation & bell projects.
But I’m waiting on not being mildly outraged when I see the prices. Not just RAM prices, the whole cost of living has been dynamic for some time, and as a responsible citizen ( yeah right!) that situation should be observed and a more considered view to consuming is probably of global benefit ultimately. The joy for me is that I believe I have the resource to make such choices. Sadly others, may not be so sanguine.
Pi5 was a enormous change, culturally on almost every front, but time must be taken to thank the loathsome reptiles that construct the resources that largely satisfy our desires. The fact that we can still run on a Pi3 should also be applauded, and there is good ground to be made on the 3 & 4, because at the time they were considered highly acceptable.
Put the time gained into designing for CM5’s, perhaps, and try to consider how to do those damn colour coded switches on a board of your own constructing….
And extra soup for everybody, just cos my bike broke. . .
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@wyleu hope your bike is up and running soon!
I find it is possible to get hold of a shiny and somewhat affordable Pi 4 or 5 with enough RAM, given enough patience. A search filter on a local second hand or auction site tends to bring good news, just like with musical instruments and gizmos.
Regards
Bernard
Hadn’t considered that as a route.
Bike is looking increasingly surplus….
I don’t know how many Pi5’s one could get for the Giant I’m probably going to have to buy.