It's a hobbyist computer/learning platform whose biggest draws are price and community support. Demand/support isn't flagging so performance and connectivity doesn't seem to be an issue for the target market. The biggest community wishes were answered, more USB ports and bundled wifi. If the RPi can't keep up with what you're doing there are plenty of other more powerful and more expensive options out there.

The problem right now is that you have to choose between good community support or a better/faster SoC.

I wish there was a Raspberry Pi 4 with 2x USB 2.0, 1xUSB 3.0, 1xUSB-C 3.0, Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11ac.

The 3+ has half of what you're looking for: 802.11ac and gigabit ethernet (although it's limited to ~300 Mbps by USB2).

That all being said, I feel like what you're looking for is a small-form-factor computer, not a development board. :)

There are plenty of more powerful and cheaper options too, it's just that the Raspberry Pi has mindshare amongst people writing about hobbyist and maker stuff. I have decidedly mixed feelings about the Raspberry Pi community as a whole; while they're certainly vocal and numerous, they used to have an unfortunate cultural tendency towards blaming any problems on the users being too stupid to use a Pi, even ones caused by major bugs in the Pi itself.

Wondering if you can link some examples of this? Genuinely curious. I've been using the Pi for some for-fun projects lately and haven't encountered limitations caused by the platform just yet so I haven't experienced this (yet? hopefully ever?).

What are some more powerful cheaper options?

Orange Pi and ODROID-C2, and there are a few slightly more expensive but vastly faster and higher specced options (like the Tinker Board). But the onboarding experience and ongoing support is usually far worse than with the Pi.

At least in the UK, the ODROID-C2 is around £50 (compared to £35 for the latest Rpi). So Yeh more powerful, but ~50% more expensive.

Hopefully the RockPro64 will be released soon.

Major features

2x A72 + 4x a53. (4000 in geekbench)

mini PCIe connector/PCIe x4 (supports SATA expansion card)

USB 3.0

Prices

Rockpro64 2GB board, $59-65

Rockpro64 4GB board, $79

Rockpro64-AI 4GB board, $99

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=5614