Actually 2. Why? Because they are $15.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/131963395388
 
How?
 
I asked the ebay seller some questions, and he answers that they were used by a school (College?) for a robotics project, and in doing so, they ripped out the USB Ports, power port and video out to make them fit into the robots. They since updated to the later (Newer) Beagle Bone Blacks and Beagle Bone Greens which has more RAM so they are selling the older ones that has 512MB of RAM. With the ports missing, to get them to work, one has to get new ports. Sounds simple - right?
 
Replacing the ports is simple enough, I did it for the R-Pi's and posted how too here. But getting the ports - that's the problem. I have to order them from Hong Kong, and anything from Hong Kong has a 6 week wait!
 
So while I wait for the ports, I will be getting one intact Beagle Bone Black for $30 to study but I got to raise up the money first. There's one on ebay with its Flash-RAM reloaded with a different operating system. So lets see what happens.
 

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The Beagle Bone Black is like the R-Pi but he makers (TI - Texas Instruments) do not consider it is as a "Computer" like the Raspberry Foundation considers its Raspberry Pi. They consider it as an "Embedded Linux-Based device."
 
But the Beagle Bone uses a similar CPU/GPU set up as the R-Pi, so its a computer in its own right. It uses the same ARM CPU licensed and made by TI. But it also comes with 80 pin GPIO (40 for digital and 40 for analog! The R-Pi as 40 for Digital only) and 2GB of Flash-RAM and an SD Card holder so you can boot from Flash-RAM or the SD Card. It's Linux is called Angstrom though it can take Armbian (Debian) and Ubuntu (also by Debian). TI Puts Angstrom in the 2 GB Flash-RAM Space and when you buy one they say that you should update it.
 
TI has the Beagle Bone act more like an Arduino than An R-Pi. It's Software base is small if you stick with the Angstrom Library. They have a helpful but tiny community. Again TI's fault. All the negatives of the Beagle Bone is because of TI. But it is a respectable machine: 512MB RAM and a 1GHZ CPU - like a fast R-Pi Model B. It can turn on through the USB or Power Port, and you need to get drivers for your PC to connect to it - like and Arduino. After you set it up, you can have it as a computer (that it is).
 
I'll be posting up more info when I get them and repair them.

Interesting.  I see the cons but what are the pros?

The Pro's are few compared to a Pi. According to my friend who has one running his websites he develops for his clients, it is faster than the R-Pi. This probably because of the Flash-RAM being accessed in parallel addressing instead of serial addressing as on the SD Card.
 
Plus it has 40 analog input/output, so it can handle raw data from a sensor and does not need to be converted to a digital signal as in the Raspberry Pi. The Arduino also has Analog inputs/outputs but only 8 of them unless you get the Mega265 but that is a monster of an arduino unit to handle - with 128 pins and 1/2 of those are digital and 1/2 are analog. And those little witches are expensive to get!
 
I'm just getting it because of it's low price, and the US Market (how ever small it is) is larger than the Raspberry Pi Market. Unfortunately the support group does not show that. So you're almost on your own with the Beagle Bone. For me, I'm noticing that the Ham and Hacker groups are breaking up into Beagle Bone vs Raspberry Pi vs Banana Pi vs Orange Pi vs Other Pi's. With the Hackers, they are going to the Orange Pi because the O-Pi Mini has Wifi and Bluetooth, which they can use to hack into Wifi Networks. I have yet to see The CHIP out there... yet.
 
It's like in my old days with First Star. Sure, I was their top Commodore programmer. But I had to get an Atari, an Apple and a couple other machines and learn them... Damn!