Not easily impressed...

[cloudformdesign]

Hell ya pfalcon. All of Intels hardware is crap in my opinion, for all the reasons you gave - bloated software and unable to modify or upgrade. If you need more power, do an O Droid or Raspi 2. Micropython is a significant advancement for the general lower power case.

[pythoncoder]

@pfalcon Personally I'm happy with soldering. But most boards aimed at the euphemistically titled "maker" market do offer headers like Arduino or connectors as on the Pi, so people can buy shields and plug them in. Perhaps they've done market research: if so the Pyboard might sell more if this were an option. But I certainly wouldn't want to lose the option to buy a bare board for the reasons discussed above.

There is also the education market where I'd imagine a bare board is a deal-breaker.

As for price I think the Pyboard is excellent value for money.

[kfricke]

...
As for price I think the Pyboard is excellent value for money.

*signed*