Raspberry Foundation which launched the Raspberry Pi 4 last year has unveiled the Pi 400 a keyboard that is actually a CPU with 4GB RAM crammed inside. The new device takes out the stress of setting up the Raspberry Pi 4 single-board computer (SBC) which usually involves connecting to a keyboard, monitor and mouse.
With this compact keyboard dubbed Raspberry Pi 400, you get not just a keyboard but also a USB power supply, an SD card with Raspberry Pi OS pre-installed, a micro HDMI cable for connecting it to a display.
Interestingly, the Raspberry Pi 400 keyboards integrated with a computer carries an amazing price tag of $70. However, bundled with a USB power supply, an SD card, a micro HDMI cable, and a Raspberry Pi Beginner’s Guide, the kit costs $100.
Design-wise, the Raspberry Pi 400 draws inspiration from the home computers of the 1980s that had their motherboard built into the keyboard, such as the BBC Micro, ZX Spectrum and Commodore Amiga. The device is based on the Raspberry Pi 4 meaning that most of the computer features are similar. A few upgrades include the Broadcom BCM2711 quad-core Cortex-A72 (Arm v8) 64-bit SoC with a higher clock frequency of 1.8GHz onboard the Raspberry Pi 400.
Other key differences are that the Raspberry Pi 400 only offers HDMI for audio output whereas the Pi 4 SBC also has a 3.5mm audio and video jack. There’s also one fewer USB 2.0 port on the Raspberry Pi 400.
The Raspberry Pi 400 does feature a horizontal 40-pin GPIO header on the rear of the keyboard, so it’s possible to add physical HAT extensions, such as a camera. There’s also a built-in heatsink in the Raspberry Pi 400 that’s not included with the SBC. It features support for dual-band 2.4GHz and 5.0GHz WiFi, Bluetooth 5.0, BLE Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0 port, USB 2.0 port and more.
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