No, that's not quite correct. Let me try to explain in simple terms (with some generalisionsSo, as I understand, each raspberry Pi can only perform one task (such as games console or media player)?
)The RPi Imaging Utility installs images.
An image is a bit-by-bit copy of a complete drive that may contain 1 or more partitions.
An image normally contains a complete Operating System, such as Linux, Windows, MacOS, Raspberry Pi OS etc.
Installing an image will wipe out everything that was previously on your drive (SD card or whatever).
When you install Raspberry Pi OS on your SD card, you get a flavour of Linux, plus many additional programs, such as LibreOFFICE, media players etc.
You can add extra programs to your Operating System, but you use a package manager such as 'apt'. On the forums and documentation you will see mention of doing:
Code:
sudo apt updatesudo apt upgradesudo apt install <some program name>Raspberry Pi OS is an example of a general purpose Operating System that can run many things, including media players and retro arcade games (just like Windows or MacOS). It is quite large.
But there are also some small lighter weight images that are designed just to run one program, so they contain a very lightweight operating system which just boots up into that single program. Volumio is one such example that is designed just as a media player. LIbreELEC is another example that contains "Just enough operating system to run Kodi" (sic) (Another media player).
Often these lighter weight images do not allow you to run arbitrary programs like LIbreOFFICE because they are optimised for that one program.
Raspberry PI OS can equally run media players and retro games etc, if you find an appropriate program to install.
Most people will install one image on an SD card (like Raspberry Pi OS) and use it for all their programs.
If they want to run retro games, they might install another image (e.g. operating system + retro console + various games) to a separate SD card and swap SD cards when they need to. In the PC world, it's like pulling your hard drive out and replacing it with another, which is not very practical there, but much easier on a Raspberry Pi when you're dealing with SD cards.
As mentioned above, PINN allows you to install multiple images to a single SD card or other drive, and at boot time you can select which Operating System you want to use (you cannot use them both at the same time). This is an alternative to swapping out SD cards. Once you install PINN on your SD card, you can use it to install other Operating Systems on the same SD card, which seems to be what you expected at the start of this thread. It does have some limitations, but it can be useful for trying out different Operating Systems to see which ones you want to use.
I hope this helps explains some the differences between images, operating systems and programs/applications. Enjoy experimenting and learning!
Statistics: Posted by procount — Fri Nov 22, 2024 12:54 pm