RPi HardwareHistory

Which Pi have I got?
You can try to check which Pi you have by looking at the board layout and the components used, but this might not be very easy or reliable. Since the range of Pi models gives a significant difference in performance, this can be quite important, especially if not buying through the approved channels.

Board Revision History
The reliable way to find out your board revision is to use the following command: cat /proc/cpuinfo You will see your device data including: Hardware	: BCM2708 Revision	: 0003

If you see a "1000" at the front of the Revision, e.g. 10000002 then it indicates that your Raspberry Pi has been over-volted, and your board revision is simply the last 4 digits (i.e. 0002 in this example).

Another method to obtain just the revision ID (also removes any overvoltage mark): cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep 'Revision' | awk '{print $3}' | sed 's/^1000//' or more simply: awk '/^Revision/ {sub("^1000", "", $3); print $3}' /proc/cpuinfo or use a web tool rev=$(awk '/^Revision/ { print $3 }' /proc/cpuinfo) && curl -L perturb.org/rpi?rev=$rev

Significant design changes
The following changes were made in the early models.

ECN0001
ECN0001 is the request to not fit D14 and to replace poly-fuses F1 and F2 with 0 ohm.

D14 Removal
D14 can interfere with some CEC devices if the Pi is left plugged in and unpowered. The benefits of having it are minimal so it was removed.

F1 & F2 Replacement/Removal
F1 & F2 can cause problems with some USB devices which draw high current. In particular due to the recovery characteristics of the poly-fuses, it can take a while to recover their low resistance state afterwards, adding additional problems for other devices (lower voltage on the USB bus).

Model B Revision 2.0
This model is based on a new PCB layout that includes previous build fixes from ECN0001 such us removal of the poly-fuses in series with the +5V power for USB devices, and other fixes reported by the community such as the erroneous connection of the LAN9512 VDD18CORE pins to the +1V8 power plane, addition of the 8-pin P5 header (non-populated) for extra GPIO pins, addition to the 2-pin P6 header (non-populated) for a RESET button, and other changes and improvements reported in more detail.



Colour Variations
The vast majority of the Raspberry Pis produced have a  Green  PCB, but Pis produced by Egoman_Technology_Corp (only available in the Far East) have a  Red  PCB, and RS Components produced a limited edition of anniversary Pis in  Blue . The red-PCB model sold in the far east is functionally the same as the standard green-PCB model sold in the rest of the world, but it has not passed the compliance testing required for sale in those areas (for example, FCC in the USA, and CE Mark in the EU).

Current models
The following models can be considered current due to the large numbers that were shipped. They may be available from commercial suppliers or as pre-owned models.

Raspberry Pi 4 Model B
Announced on 24th June 2019 (announcement). The Raspberry Pi 4 is a new Pi design, with ethernet + USB ports swapping positions from previous models. In addition, the 4 has three variants, only differing in amount of RAM: 1/2/4GB models, selling for $35/45/55.

The Raspberry Pi 4 features:
 * Broadcom BCM2711 SoC, with quad-core ARM Cortex-A72 1.5 GHz processor
 * 1GB, 2GB, or 4GB of LPDDR4 SDRAM
 * Full-throughput Gigabit Ethernet
 * Dual-band 802.11ac wireless networking
 * Bluetooth 5.0
 * Two USB 3.0 and two USB 2.0 ports
 * Dual monitor support, at resolutions up to 4K
 * VideoCore VI graphics, supporting OpenGL ES 3.x
 * 4Kp60 hardware decode of HEVC video
 * Power over USB-C connector (v1.0 board has a faulty USB-C design which limits the cables that can be used to power the Pi (see here)).
 * Complete compatibility with earlier Raspberry Pi products

Announced on 28th May 2020 (announcement) was a new version of the 4B with the same board but supporting 8GB of LPDDR4 SDRAM.

Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+
Announced on "Pi Day", 14th March 2018 (announcement). The Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ is an incremental improvement over the previous Pi 3 Model B for the same US$35 price.

The Raspberry Pi 3+ features:
 * A 1.4GHz 64-bit quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 CPU
 * Dual-band 802.11ac wireless LAN and Bluetooth 4.2
 * Faster Ethernet (Gigabit Ethernet over USB 2.0)
 * Power-over-Ethernet support (with separate PoE HAT)
 * Improved PXE network and USB mass-storage booting
 * Improved thermal management

Raspberry Pi 3 Model B
Announced on 29th Feb 2016 (full announcement from the Raspberry Pi Foundation). The Raspberry Pi 3 retains the same US$35 price point of the Raspberry Pi 2 model B while adding built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

The Raspberry Pi 3 features:
 * Broadcom BCM2837 SoC, with quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 1200 MHz processor
 * VideoCore IV dual-core 400 MHz GPU
 * 1 GB SDRAM - shared by the GPU and CPU
 * MicroSD card slot for boot and storage
 * 2.4GHz 802.11n wireless LAN and Bluetooth 4.1
 * 4 x USB 2.0 ports (via on-board 5 port hub)
 * RJ45 10/100 MBit/s Ethernet port
 * HDMI and Composite video, audio through TRRS jack
 * 40 pin GPIO Interface connector
 * CSI (camera) and DSI (display) connectors
 * 4 squarely positioned mounting holes

Raspberry Pi 2 Model B
Announced on 2nd Feb 2015 (full announcement from the Raspberry Pi Foundation). The Raspberry Pi 2 retains the same US$35 price point of the model B+.

The Raspberry Pi 2 features:
 * Broadcom BCM2836 SoC, with quad-core ARM Cortex-A7 900 MHz processor
 * VideoCore IV dual-core 250 MHz GPU
 * 1 GB SDRAM - shared by the GPU and CPU
 * MicroSD card slot for boot and storage
 * 4 x USB 2.0 ports (via on-board 5 port hub)
 * RJ45 10/100 MBit/s Ethernet port
 * HDMI and Composite video, audio through TRRS jack
 * 40 pin GPIO Interface connector
 * CSI (camera) and DSI (display) connectors
 * 4 squarely positioned mounting holes

Raspberry Pi Model B+
Announced on 14th July 2014 (full announcement from the Raspberry Pi Foundation).

The Raspberry Pi B+ features:
 * Broadcom BCM2835 SoC, with ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz processor
 * VideoCore IV dual-core 250 MHz GPU
 * 512 MB SDRAM - shared by the GPU and CPU
 * MicroSD card slot for boot and storage
 * 4 x USB 2.0 ports (via on-board 5 port hub)
 * RJ45 10/100 MBit/s Ethernet port
 * HDMI and Composite video, audio through TRRS jack
 * 40 pin GPIO, I2C, SPI, UART interface connector
 * CSI (camera) and DSI (display) connectors
 * 4 squarely positioned mounting holes

Raspberry Pi Compute Module
Announced on 7th Apr 2014 Full announcement from the Raspberry Pi Foundation.

The compute module contains the guts of a Raspberry Pi (the BCM2835 processor and 512 MB of RAM) as well as a 4 GB eMMC Flash device. This is integrated on to a small 67.6x30mm board which fits into a standard DDR2 SODIMM connector.

Raspberry Pi Model A Full Production Board

 * As of Feb 2013, available from distributors in Europe but not North America
 * Board has 256 MB of RAM rather than the originally planned 128 MB
 * The Foundation produced a small Beta batch before handing manufacturing over to RS and Farnell
 * The Model A boards actually use the identical Revision2.0 PCB as Model B boards, just with a different selection of components fitted (full details available from the schematics). AFAIK no Model A boards using the Revision1.0 PCBs were ever publicly available (or indeed ever made?).

Raspberry Pi Model B Full Production Board

 * Announced: April 2012, first orders sent out June 2012.
 * Manufacturing and Orders will be made through RS and Farnell
 * This means a much higher volume of units will be produced and made available.
 * Additional detail is available about the manufacturing and distribution agreement here video interview between Eben Upton and SlashDot here (28/02/12).
 * Announced: September 2012, Raspberry Pi Model B Rev 2.0 is now manufactured at Sony's manufacturing plant on Pencoed, South Wales. Full announcement from the Raspberry Pi Foundation, Element14 announcement on Raspberry Pi discussion board.

Historical and Development models
These are unlikely to be readily available, and would then be in demand by collectors.

Raspberry Pi 1st Production Board

 * Announced: 29th Feb 2012 - Start of Sale Only
 * Credit-card Format
 * Initial 10k Batch (All Model B's) Manufactured in China (Jan/Feb 2012)
 * Should look identical to the Raspberry Pi Beta Board below (except different SDCard holder).
 * The board has a yellow RCA connector, rather than the black one used in the Beta's.
 * Nokia/Qt Development group has donated vouchers for 400 RPi units for developers
 * The batch was delayed several weeks due to the RJ45 network connector being substituted for the wrong part and also so the board could undergo compliance testing

Raspberry Pi Beta Production Board

 * Announced: December 2011
 * Credit-Card Format
 * Manufactured in UK
 * Produced 100 PCBs
 * Characteristic feature of hand-modded correction to PCB
 * See the blog post which includes a video explaining how the production units will differ from the beta boards.


 * Pre-production board (beta board) PCB, topside
 * Pre-production board (beta board) PCB, underside
 * Pre-production board vs credit-card

eBay Auction
10 of the completed Model B boards were auctioned on eBay (Started on 1st Jan 2012) ) Board #7 was anonymously (and generously) donated to Centre for Computing History (also spotted here..)!

Board #8 Owned by Tech Blogger, Paul Maunders, see his blog for details

Raspberry Pi Alpha Board



 * Announced: August 2011
 * Large Format for debugging (Model B)
 * Populated with headers for GPIO, JTAG, DSI, CSI, as well as switches and LEDs for I/O testing.


 * Alpha prototype board, underside



Raspberry Pi USB Prototype Board

 * Announced: May 2011
 * The "Computer On A USB Stick" Format
 * Included built-in camera
 * HDMI one end and single USB the other
 * Introduced the RPi Foundation to the world (any earlier links appreciated), featured by BBC Online Video.
 * Known internally at Broadcom as the MicroDB



Raspberry Pi Concept 2006 edition

 * Vero-board Prototype & PCB Version
 * Atmel ATmega644 microcontroller clocked at 22.1 MHz



Official Camera
The foundation sells a handful of different cameras. Identifying the one in use via software can be done by first identifying which device it is. Usually it will be /dev/video0 however the presence of USB cameras will change this.

v4l2-ctl --list-devices

This will list a number of devices (not all of them are video devices, some are used for hardware accelerated video encoding and decoding). Look for one that has platform:bcm2835-v4l2 in the name, like this:

mmal service 16.1 (platform:bcm2835-v4l2-0): /dev/video2

This shows the Pi camera is located at /dev/video2.

Next, query the device for supported resolutions. This uses the default /dev/video0 so change if needed.

v4l2-ctl -d /dev/video0 --list-formats-ext

A list of video capture formats will be shown. Look for the largest capture resolution. For example, there may be an entry like this:

[0]: 'YU12' (Planar YUV 4:2:0) Size: Stepwise 32x32 - 2592x1944 with step 2/2

This indicates that the largest frame size is 2592x1944 which matches a version 1.x camera. The full list of resolutions is available in the official docs, but in summary:

Video

 * BBC iClick's Peter Price asks whether a £15 computer can solve the programming gap (6 minutes, 3 June 2011)
 * Raspberry Pi's David Braben talks to BBC's Rory Cellan-Jones (2:28 minutes, 5 May 2011)
 * Raspberry Pi community tutorials on YouTube

Audio

 * Podcast of a phone interview with Eben about the project and the motivations behind it (15 minutes long.) (3 June 2011) Transcription here.