Difference Between Arduino and Raspberry Pi

Key Difference – Arduino vs Raspberry Pi
 

The key difference between Arduino and Raspberry Pi is that Arduino is a microcontroller development board while raspberry pi is a general purpose computer based on Linux Operating System.

Selecting Arduino or Raspberry Pi depends on the project to be developed. This article discusses the most common Arduino Uno and Raspberry Pi B+. Generally, comparing to Arduino, the power consumption is lower and the speed is higher in Raspberry pi.

CONTENTS

1. Overview and Key Difference
2. What is Arduino
3. What is Raspberry Pi
4. Similarities Between Arduino and Raspberry Pi
5. Side by Side Comparison – Arduino vs Raspberry Pi in Tabular Form
6. Summary

What is Arduino?

The Arduino development board contains microcontrollers, programming hardware, USB programming interface, reset button, power connector etc. There are various types of Arduino boards such as Arduino Uno, Mega, Nano. The most common Arduino board which is Arduino Uno has two microcontrollers. The ATmega328 is programmed by the user. The ATmega16U2 is already pre-programmed and it is used for USB communication. The IO pins are used to connect to the outside world. There are digital pins and analog pins.

The Arduino IDE is used to write the programs for the development board. It is can be used to write code, compile, debug and finally to upload the code to the board. The Arduino IDE makes the project development faster and easier. This software is a free and open source. The programs written in Arduino IDE are similar to C programs.  It is easy to integrate Arduino with hardware using shields.  This shield can be directly stacked to the Arduino.  The Ethernet shield is used to connect to the Ethernet. The color LCD shield is used to interface to the display. The programmer can directly use these shield and call the necessary library functions to perform the required task.

What is Raspberry Pi?

Raspberry Pi runs on an Operating System (OS). It is an extra layer of software that handles hardware. In Arduino, the application directly runs on the microcontroller but in raspberry pi, the application should go through the OS to control hardware.

 There are different versions such as Raspberry pi A, B, B+. Raspberry Pi B+ contains the Broadcom BCM 2836 System on Chip (SoC). It has the processors and the other components connected to make an entire system. The processor is Broadcom BCM 2826 ARM based processor. ARM processors are the core of most IoT devices. Raspberry Pi can be programmed using languages such as Python, C++.

It also contains a Graphical Processing Unit (GPU). It helps to speed up graphics. It has 40 General Purpose Input Output Pins (GPIO).  There are 4 USB ports and RJ45 Ethernet port.  There is a USB Ethernet Interface IC is used to communicate with Ethernet and USB ports. There is also a CSI Camera connector. HDMI port helps to connect the device to the monitor.  The DSI is a monitor interface for displays. It is an alternative to HDMI. The micro SD card is inside the micro SD slot. It is on the back side of the board.

What is the Similarity Between Arduino and Raspberry Pi?

• Both Arduino and Raspberry Pi can be used to build Internet of Things (IoT) and Embedded systems.

What is the Difference Between Arduino and Raspberry Pi?

Summary – Arduino vs Raspberry Pi

This article discussed the difference between Arduino and Raspberry Pi. The difference between Arduino and Raspberry Pi is that Arduino is a microcontroller development board while raspberry pi is a general purpose computer based on Linux Operating System.

Reference:

1.“Arduino.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 27 Mar. 2018. Available here 
2.“Raspberry Pi.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 30 Mar. 2018. Available here 

Image Courtesy:

1.’Arduino-uno-perspective-transparent’By JotaCartas (talk) – Arduino-uno-perspective.jpg, (CC BY 2.0) via Commons Wikimedia
2.’Raspberry PI’By Onepiece84 – Own work, (CC BY-SA 4.0) via Commons Wikimedia