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What Is Raspberry Pi OS?

Raspbian is a free Debian-based operating system optimized for the Raspberry Pi hardware. Raspbian provides more than a pure operating system, coming with over 35,000 pre-compiled software packages for easy installation on the Raspberry Pi.

Who Uses Raspberry Pi OS?

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Raspberry Pi OS Software - 1

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Reviews of Raspberry Pi OS

Average score

Overall
4.8
Ease of Use
4.6
Customer Service
4.0
Features
4.6
Value for Money
4.9

Reviews by company size (employees)

  • <50
  • 51-200
  • 201-1,000
  • >1,001

Find reviews by score

5
82%
4
18%
Nabin
Nabin
CEO in Nepal
Verified LinkedIn User
Computer Software, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Debian based official OS for Raspberry Pi computers

5.0 3 years ago

Comments: Raspberry PI OS has made it possible to develop low-cost computers and IoT devices.

Pros:

With Raspberry Pi OS it is possible to develop extremely light and affordable computers and IoT devices. It is best suited for developers and hobbyists. It is a dedicated OS for ARM processors and supports hardware rendering. It is free and supported by the Raspberry Pi foundation with a wide range of official boards to meet any kind of commercial project needs.

Cons:

Still immature for enterprise-level implementation. Cannot be used for heavy computing. A hardware upgrade is not possible.

Verified Reviewer
Verified LinkedIn User
Automotive, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Rapberry Pi an on a budget solution for scalable projects.

4.0 3 years ago

Comments: Very helpful and low budget to implement prototypes on IoT projects and low edge computing for IA.

Pros:

The way you have back up support from all the community over the world implementing projects similar to the one you might start.

Cons:

The user interface is still very command line based, given that is Linux based OS is understandable, nevertheless it needs to get better.

Maha
Assistant Professor in US
Computer Software, 501–1,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Raspberry Pi OS: Controlling Raspberry Pi I/O using Python

4.0 last year

Comments: Very good experience with the Pi as a controller for external machinery. I even used it in developing my microprocessor design courses for testing automation and interfacing applications.

Pros:

We tested Raspberry Pi OS in developing control software for Raspberry Pi 3B+ controllers. The configuration simply consists of connecting relay switches to the output ports of the Raspberry Pi to automate the on/off switching of electrical machinery. The programming language we used is Python which had all the libraries needed to control the I/O ports on the Raspberry Pi. Moreover we developed simple Web Server code on the Raspberry Pi to provide a Web user interface to the device management. Very easy to use and develop to produce real-world control applications. Would like to upgrade to Raspberry Pi 4 which promises better energy efficiency (this is a major problem I faced with task intensive processing on the Pi.

Cons:

Data as well as processing intensive operations produce a lot of heat on the Raspberry Pi. This is definitely not an issue with the OS but an architectural issue. It would be nice to upgrade and inspect with Raspberry Pi 4 as it promises better energy management. It would be great to test some machine learning training or image processing on the Pi and see how it goes in terms of energy consumption and heat dissipation.

Kyle
IT Director in US
Warehousing, 501–1,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Rasp Pi OS the Go to for Tinkering/Testing easy application implementation in production.

5.0 3 months ago

Comments: I've used this OS for many applications and for general testing/fun from robotics tinkering to mini server farms.

Pros:

Linux based, customizable, easy to work with GPIO's on the board

Cons:

It's a solid OS, nothing negative to say.

Gavin
Digital Project Manager in UK
Information Technology & Services, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Raspberry Pi OS up there with the best now

5.0 3 years ago

Pros:

For integrated systems we often use Raspberry Pi's and the Raspberry Pi OS just makes everything easy, no messing with terminal or fiddly setups, it just works and it's reliable. Bullseye has just been released and is even better.

Cons:

Raspberry Pi OS can be fiddly to get up and running and certain things, even available in Debian, just aren't available.