Raspberry Pi gets supercharged with new 1GHz "Turbo Mode" firmware

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raspberry-pi-pc.jpgRaspberry Pi, the UK-designed, super-tiny, super-cheap computer, gets a significant firmware upgrade today.

A new 1GHz ‘turbo mode’ upgrade safely overclocks the machine, without causing any heat damage to the machine’s chipset.

“We’ve been doing a lot of work to understand the impact of voltage and temperature on lifetime, and are now able to offer a ‘turbo mode’, which dynamically enables overclock and overvolt under the control of a cpufreq driver, without affecting your warranty,” reads the Raspberry Pi blog.

“We are happy that the combination of only applying turbo when busy, and limiting turbo when the BCM2835′s internal temperature reaches 85°C, means there will be no measurable reduction in the lifetime of your Raspberry Pi.”

The Raspberry Pi team recommend stress-testing the five new overclock presets with Quake 3, which should now run like a charm on the device.

Other improvements brought with the new firmware include Wi-Fi support out of the box, better analogue audio quality and a pre-installed game called PenguinsPuzzle.

Gerald Lynch
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