VIA APC8750 review

VIA APC8750 Review

Manufacturer: VIA
UK price (as reviewed): £39.99 (inc VAT)
US price (includes PSU): $49.00 (ex TAX)

It should surprise no-one, given its incredible success, that the Raspberry Pi has inspired competitors. Ignoring those devices that existed prior to the Pi hitting headlines around the world - things like the open-source BeagleBoard and BeagleBone platforms, both of which preceded the Pi - there has been an explosion of low-cost - and not-so-low-cost - single-board computers.

VIA, meanwhile, has had a rough time of it lately. While the company is hanging on despite failing to make a dent in the processor market with its low-power x86 chips, it is certainly far from its glory days - and Paul Otellini using the company as the punchline to a joke about ARM's chances against Intel must have surely stung.


Enter the company's newest product line, designed to thumb its nose at Intel and its high-power x86 designs while simultaneously pushing its way into a market for low-cost low-power tinkering boards that few in the industry had guessed existed prior to the launch of the Raspberry Pi.

VIA's first entry into the ARM-based single-board computer market comes with a new sub-brand: APC. Allegedly inspired by a quote from Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, in which he described his company as being in the business of making 'bicycles for the mind,' APC is being operated as an entire sub-brand with one goal: to produce low-cost computers for education and developing nations.


Freeing itself from the constraints of size - the APC design is significantly larger than the Pi, for reasons that will become readily apparent - and with a team of actual, full-time and salaried engineers rather than a rag-tag group of volunteers, VIA should have been able to come up with something that can wipe the floor with the Pi.

Shouldn't it?