Eloquent except the Rpi has a terrible USB bus.
It got significantly better in the last generation. As a result the disk I/O and network are significantly faster. While the last 2 versions had GigE, the throughput almost doubled in the last generation.
> RaspberryPis can emulate Mario Kart on an N64
Yes they can, and Golden Eye. I have just played Mario Kart with the kid before bedtime. It stutters a little if you have too many karts on screen, but that’s not a problem when you’re winning.
If a crappy NAS can run disk encryption, so can a raspberry pi. They're deceivingly potent.