This paper presents a comparison between a consumer grade EEG (electroencephalography) amplifier and a medical grade equipment. Using the same set of EEG electrodes, signals recorded from the OpenBCI board are compared side-by-side with those recorded from the g.tec g.USBamp device. Two BCI (brain-computer interface) applications are studied: a P300 speller and a workload estimator. In both applications EEG features are highly correlated. Moreover, the classification performances obtained with the OpenBCI board come close to the accuracy achieved with the g.tec g.USBamp. Overall, these preliminary results suggest that the OpenBCI board -- or a similar solution based on the Texas Instrument ADS1299 chip -- may be an alternative to traditional EEG amplifiers, widening the realm of applications and increasing the number of potential users.