Raspberry Pi 4 now with 8GB of RAM, free Nest Mini, and more

Your tech news digest, by way of the DGiT Daily tech newsletter, for Thursday, May 28. Last night’s mission scrub due to weather was a reminder that the world isn’t quite in our control yet. And if you were disappointed, it probably took years off the crew. But those astronauts sure are cool customers, sitting just 20 minutes away from flying to outer space, and just sounding chuffed about the whole thing being so great, per Bob Behnken’s Twitter. New time and date: 3:22PM ET on Saturday, May 30th, but poor weather is set to remain a factor. The next backup is then Sunday at 3pm ET.

1. Raspberry Pi 4 now with 8GB of RAM

Gary Sims dropped me a line this morning: the Raspberry Pi 4 now has an 8GB RAM option, for $75. This is not earth-shattering, but it does open up unearthly cheap desktop computing options, including web browsing, and more DIY-tinkering.

• What you now get is the same as before: an ARM-based CPU, ports galore with dual 4K support, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and now more RAM.
• Plus, of course, the flourishing community of computer enthusiasts who write applications just for the device, along with offering hardware customizations and mods like mounts or hubs that can offer extra cooling or hold SSDs, and so on.
• What’s cool about 8GB of LPDDR4-3200 SDRAM isn’t that a Pi-hole will run better, but that apps like Chrome that consume RAM when you naturally browse in different tabs will be viable.
• The official announcement also mentions a 64-bit variant of the existing 32-bit operating system, and both images now have a new name: Raspberry Pi OS, replacing the old Raspbian naming.

Now the current lineup for the Raspberry Pi 4 looks like this:

• $35: 2GB RAM
• $55: 4GB of RAM
• $75: 8GB of RAM

More discussion on the official blog and chatter on Hacker news.

2. Got YouTube Premium or Play Music, and you’re in the US? Google has a free Nest Mini for you. No strings other than you’ve already been a subscriber, so not for new subs! (Android Authority).

3. Reports: Sony PlayStation 5 might have a big reveal on June 3 (Android Authority).

4. Zoom will cut you off if you don’t update before May 30: get Zoom version 5.0 (Android Authority).

5. The launch of HBO Max has been quirky. Reports have included both problems logging in and streaming, and adoration for easy-access. The now-available catalog is both impressive and full of weird holes. Like, all the Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogy films are available, except for the middle Hobbit film, The Desolation of Smaug. For reasons…? (The Verge).

6. Pulling apart a £339 anti-5G USB stick… turns out it’s just a USB stick with a sticker. (BBC).

7. Apple buys AI startup Inductiv to improve Siri’s data, by using AI to clean up data, which in turns supports machine learning improvements. It was co-founded by machine-learning professors from Stanford University, the University of Waterloo and the University of Wisconsin at Madison (Bloomberg).

8. Here’s an iPod Touch prototype with centered rear facing camera. I think that detail was known in the past but it’s fun to see in the wild (Twitter).

9. Uber is scrapping tens of thousands of Jump bikes during a nationwide bike shortage (The Verge). This is awful, those bikes were actually super solid.

10. Instagram will (finally) pay influencers through IGTV (Wired).

11. “What was the peak population of dinosaurs?” (r/askscience).

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