Raspberry Pi 3 A+

Raspberry Pi 3 model A+ board

The Raspberry Pi 3 Model A+ is the latest model in the Raspberry Pi 3 range. The Pi 3 A+ comes with a 64-bit quad core processor that runs at 1.4 GHz, Bluetooth 4.2/BLE and dual-band, either 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz wireless LAN, just as the Raspberry Pi 3 B+.

The dual-band wireless LAN is modular compliance certificated, thanks to this, the board can be designed into end products. Besides, this grants the further advantage of reduced wireless LAN compliance testing, that grants lower cost and time to market.

The Raspberry Pi 3 Model A+ comes with the same mechanical footprint as we find in the Raspberry Pi 1 Model A+, although it has the power of the 3B+.

Mattley has created a vintage radio with this product!

Raspberry Pi 3 model A+ features are:

• Processor: Broadcom BCM2837B0, Cortex-A53; 64-bit SoC (system-on-chip) @ 1.4 GHz
• Memory: 512MB LPDDR2 SDRAM
• Connectivity:2.4 GHz and 5 GHz IEE 802.11.b/g/n/ac wireless LAN; Bluetooth 4.2/BLE
• Access: Extended 40-pin GPIO header
• Full-size HDMI
• MIPI DSI display port
• MIPI CSI camera port
• 4 pole stereo output and composite video port
• Multimedia: H.264, MPEG-4 decode (1080p30); H.264 encode (1080p30); OpenGL ES 1.1, 2.0 graphics
• SD card support: Micro SD format for loading operating system and data storage
• 5V/2.5 A DC via micro USB connector
• 5 V DC via GPIO header

The RPi 3 A+ is a reduced version of the RPi 3 B+. Both of them have the Broadcom BCM2837B0 SoC that runs at 1.4GHz frequency and is placed under the heat-spreader in metal. Although the RPI 3 B+ has 1GB of RAM, the RPI 3A+ rocks with its 512MB RAM. Like the RPI 3B+, also the RPI 3A+ features a radio, so it is an on-board networking uses the same decisive PMIC (power management chip). One of the differences between these models is that the RPI 3A+ has only one USB 2.0 port instead of 4 ports as the RPI 3B+.

Furthermore, on the RPI 3A+ board you can connect peripherals to the full-size DSI (display) and CSI (camera) ports.

If the RPI 3 A+ is compared to the RPi 1 A+, they won’t seem to be members of the same family because the latest model has 64-bit SoC, 1.4GHz processor, and wireless LAN and Bluetooth, while the original RPI 1 A+ has a 32-bit SoC, 700MHz processor and no built-in wireless connection.