Raspberry Pi 3 Goes On Sale With Faster Chipset, Wifi And Bluetooth

The Raspberry Pi 3, the latest model in the hugely popular series of single-board computers, has been launched today.

The new computer boasts a 64-bit 1.2GHz quad-core CPU, 1GB of RAM, and built-in wireless LAN and Bluetooth.

It has a huge performance advantage over the others (the Pi 3 is 10 times more powerful than the first Pi), but its wireless capabilities are being presented as its main selling points.

Pi Foundation founder Eben Upton said the Pi 3 makes it easier than ever for users to create ‘hubs’ for their ‘Internet of Things’ devices, programming the computer to act as a single connected controller for all the internet-enabled gadgets around the home.

“This is the first Pi you can stick behind your TV and completely forget about,” he said.

Despite the changes, the Pi 3 is still fully compatible with projects and tutorials designed for its predecessors.

The Pi 3 is on sale from 29 February, for the price of £30. Upton said a “few hundred thousand units” will be avaiable from day one, so hopefully there won’t be any shortages.

The release of the Pi 3 comes exactly four years to the day after the launch of the original Pi, which sparked a passion for coding in many who had never tried it before and made the company a household name.

Since then, a number of different models have been released and over eight million units have been shipped to customers – making it the best-selling British computer of all time.