<p>I have an Ender 3 V2 running off a Raspberry Pi and Octoprint, and it works.   I'm trying to tune the prints and improve output, and I'm not sure how much impact the Pi has on the print quality.</p>
<p>The Pi I have is below recommended specs, being a &quot;Raspberry Pi Model B Plus Rev 1.2&quot; with 512 MB ram.  This has one 700 MHz ARM CPU core, and the load average suggests it is CPU-bound</p>
<pre><code>00:30:54 up 8 days, 16:25,  1 user,  load average: 1.88, 1.62, 1.69
</code></pre>
<p>Memory usage is fine, with 84 MB used out of 366 MB available, so it's not RAM-bound.</p>
<p>I have a USB webcam working too, and while I can watch a print in progress, the box cannot deal with processing timelapse.  It takes over an hour to process an hour's timelapse footage, so I had to disable that.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://octoprint.org/download/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">documentation for OctoPrint</a> states</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Recommended hardware: Raspberry Pi 3B, 3B+ or 4B. Expect print artifacts and long loading times with other options, especially when adding a webcam or installing third-party plugins. Setups not using recommended hardware are not officially supported.</p>
<p>Raspberry Pi Zero W is not recommended explicitly.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>Question:</strong>  What kind of quality issues can arise from running OctoPrint on an under-specced Pi?   And would my print quality improve with a higher-specced print server?</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-12T23:54:23.467Z
It's roughly a 3-4 month lead time for any Pi boards at this time, so not expected till 2022.
Criggie
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-13T07:24:29.127Z
Just one data point: I did not notice any quality changes moving from a 3B+ to a 4B, but user experience in terms of loading times improved significantly.
I'm running two Marlin printers, one Klipper printer, one CNC and two webcam streams from it.
towe
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-15T21:28:54.593Z
One of my printers, a Prusa i3 style printer, runs perfectly fine with a RPi 2B. No noticable defects, I'm also using it to stream a camera.
0scar
<print-quality><octoprint><raspberry-pi>
OctoPi and sub-recommended hardware spec?
Criggie
# OctoPi and sub-recommended hardware spec?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-10-12)

I have an Ender 3 V2 running off a Raspberry Pi and Octoprint, and it works. I'm trying to tune the prints and improve output, and I'm not sure how much impact the Pi has on the print quality.

The Pi I have is below recommended specs, being a "Raspberry Pi Model B Plus Rev 1.2" with 512 MB ram. This has one 700 MHz ARM CPU core, and the load average suggests it is CPU-bound

```
00:30:54 up 8 days, 16:25,  1 user,  load average: 1.88, 1.62, 1.69

```

Memory usage is fine, with 84 MB used out of 366 MB available, so it's not RAM-bound.

I have a USB webcam working too, and while I can watch a print in progress, the box cannot deal with processing timelapse. It takes over an hour to process an hour's timelapse footage, so I had to disable that.

The [documentation for OctoPrint](https://octoprint.org/download/) states

> Recommended hardware: Raspberry Pi 3B, 3B+ or 4B. Expect print artifacts and long loading times with other options, especially when adding a webcam or installing third-party plugins. Setups not using recommended hardware are not officially supported.
>
> Raspberry Pi Zero W is not recommended explicitly.

**Question:** What kind of quality issues can arise from running OctoPrint on an under-specced Pi? And would my print quality improve with a higher-specced print server?

**Tags:** print-quality, octoprint, raspberry-pi

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: It's roughly a 3-4 month lead time for any Pi boards at this time, so not expected till 2022.  
> **username_1**: Just one data point: I did not notice any quality changes moving from a 3B+ to a 4B, but user experience in terms of loading times improved significantly. I'm running two Marlin printers, one Klipper printer, one CNC and two webcam streams from it.  
> **username_2**: One of my printers, a Prusa i3 style printer, runs perfectly fine with a RPi 2B. No noticable defects, I'm also using it to stream a camera.  

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## 0 answers

