As I look at the Beaglebone, Raspberry Pi, etc, I see the possibility of using this small platform to carry curricula. Would like input on the Beagleboard Black and the Beagleboard.
I have been developing Special Education curricula over the past decade, and have the idea of placing everything I've developed onto a board for a student to use independently. My thought was to have a Linux operating system preloaded with all the curricula, PDFs, html, videos, etc. The student would simply have a plug and play access to all the resources on the board. I would like some feedback from users if the platforms could support this idea. I have the very little knowledge in this area and looking to learn.
Any input on function, Pros and Cons of each board
If this is feasible I would prototype for beta within 1 month and demo in October.
Based on your criteria, either board will work fine. Note that BBB is truly plug-and-play while the Raspberry Pi requires some (minimal) setup preparation.
“Technically”, as what is in the reference material, the rPI is supposed to use less power too. However, according to the documents I’ve read, this does not include the power used by the graphics. Which can be quite substantial. About the graphics, it is very good on paper, and in real world usage. So if you intend to use video, graphics, maybe even play games ( does not sound like it ), the rPI is the way to go. I’ve also read that the rPI is supposed to have a faster sd card implementation, but I can not confirm that personally.
I’d say the major pro’s for the Beaglebone Black would have to be processor speed, and availability( at a reasonable cost ). That is for your use case. Also, setup time is nearly non existent when compared to the rPI. Since the OS comes pre-installed. I’ve read that you can buy pre-installed sd cards for the PI, but that’s an added cost.
I should mention that the rPI’s graphics are nearly or exactly impossible to disable the graphics chip. SO that additional power that is not counted in the “power usage benchmarks” will always be used.
I would suggest looking at Dokeos or Moodle as a web-based platform to deliver your curriculum from either the Rpi or the BBB. They are both great tools.
I’ve used both in hosted settings but haven’t tried them on an embedded Linux platform yet… so I can’t vouch for performance.