Raspberry Pi Forums

My Pi3B+ run hot in the official case, open the top they cool down, no heatsink or fan.
I expect the same with the official Pi4 case.
This Pi4B1 is open air with heatsink no fan.

Lots of ED users run Pi's open so the kids can access those GPIO pins.

Basic thermodynamics, heatsinks and fans are used in enclosed Desktop PC's.
If I enclose my next Pi4, I expect a heatsink and fan will be needed unless I use something like a metal case.

Slight problem with "taking the top off an official Pi4 case" - you can't. It's designed in such a way that removing the top disassembles the entire case. It comes in two parts and both are required to secure the Pi.

Hello

For the Raspberry Pi 4, I'm going to do the same thing as on my old Raspberry Pi 3 B +. I will take the official case and add a fan Noctua NF-A5x10 (3,3V) on top.
The only difference is that I can not blow in the case because there are no removable sides so I will reverse the fan and extract the hot air from the case.

itsmedoofer wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 28, 2019 12:26 pm

I saw a 20C drop, just with the FanShim fitted, no heatsink. The USB ports were noticeably cooler as well after 10 mins of the fan running.

According to the FanShim inhouse tests they run cooler without the heatsink than with.

What we have learnt so far:
The RPi 4 needs a good airflow for cooling. Closed plastic boxes are a no go, if you don't want to lose a lot of performance (throttling).
Heat sinks help a bit, but not much, and also need a good airflow.
Using the naked board without a case and mounting it vertically seems to be sufficient.

Fans will help a lot, but I don't want fans on any of my Rpis.

How good metal cases like the FLIRC case will be is still to be decided (no airflow for the board, but the case works like a large heat sink for the SOC).

The acryl case shown below has open sides. If you add the additional spacers (as shown in the image), it can easily be mounted sideways (on the GPIO side). This gives some kind of protection and provides a good airflow for the whole board. Adding a small heat sink to the SOC (and perhaps also to the USB controller) might help a bit more.

I've asked the manufacturer if it will fit for the RPi 4 and they have already tested that it does. I'm using the same case for my RPi 3 for a long time and will also use it for my RPi 4 (which I won't get before August).

furious360 wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 09, 2019 5:24 am

The only difference is that I can not blow in the case because there are no removable sides so I will reverse the fan and extract the hot air from the case.

That will not work any better, you'll be trying to suck air out of what is essentially a poorly sealed vacuum. Try it yourself, take a plastic straw and block one end with your finger, blow into the straw. Then try to suck air through the straw.
You'll notice in both situations, it is impossible to make any air move.

I'd get out a drill and put a few holes in the plastic for ventilation.

gkreidl wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 09, 2019 8:47 am

The acryl case shown below has open sides. If you add the additional spacers (as shown in the image), it can easily be mounted sideways (on the GPIO side). This gives some kind of protection and provides a good airflow for the whole board. Adding a small heat sink to the SOC (and perhaps also to the USB controller) might help a bit more.

Have you got a link for that case - looks good.

Imperf3kt wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:23 am

That will not work any better, you'll be trying to suck air out of what is essentially a poorly sealed vacuum. Try it yourself, take a plastic straw and block one end with your finger, blow into the straw. Then try to suck air through the straw.
You'll notice in both situations, it is impossible to make any air move.

I'd get out a drill and put a few holes in the plastic for ventilation.

You're right, there is a lot of changes to make on the official case.
Geeekpi has just released its case like Pibow Coupé 4:

https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B07TVLTMX3/ref ... way&sr=8-1

I've put a big heatsink to my Pi4, but still if the case is closed after 30 min temperature is raised to more than 80 deg. Pi4 official case is big disappointment for me especially compared to the previous one where we have possibility to open side and upper panels in order to let in the air and to use GPIO with it.

Beside termal/case issues I'm quite happy with Pi4/4GB which now is not only IoT gadget, but also can be used as PC for casual use.
I hope that Raspberry Pi Foundation will come back with an official cooling solution.

I took a scalpel to an old case today, even to the side.
Little bit ugly but a bit safer to carry around.

Not sure why the new Pi4 case was designed that way.
A bit of trimming to the red top and new white side would have had a case that does old and new.

Not sure how many cases the die can do but they do wear out.
Perhaps the new case is designed to carry and top off when using?

galicin wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 6:42 am

I've put a big heatsink to my Pi4, but still if the case is closed after 30 min temperature is raised to more than 80 deg.

Inside that tiny enclosed space with no ventilation holes, I cant see that big heat sink doing anything at all. You have to get the 10 watts of heat out of the case. The large mass of the heat sink may delay the rise in temperature in the short term, but that's all.

Put you Pi in free air, on edge, and it should run very cool indeed, or at least in one of these open acrylic cases linked to above.

I think a solution for keeping the CPU cold, while having a HAT attached, is to design a "cooling HAT" between the Pi and the "useful" HAT stacked on to ! A thin blowing fan (like on laptop ones) on the "cooling HAT" could extract the hot air above the CPU and send it to one side, allowing a lower space between those stacked boards.

laurent wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 8:34 am

I think a solution for keeping the CPU cold, while having a HAT attached, is to design a "cooling HAT" between the Pi and the "useful" HAT stacked on to ! A thin blowing fan (like on laptop ones) on the "cooling HAT" could extract the hot air above the CPU and send it to one side, allowing a lower space between those stacked boards.

Well, the PoE HAT could do this, but it'd need a cut down version without the PoE bit and just the fan and fan control circuitry.

rpdom wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 9:43 am

laurent wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 8:34 am

I think a solution for keeping the CPU cold, while having a HAT attached, is to design a "cooling HAT" between the Pi and the "useful" HAT stacked on to ! A thin blowing fan (like on laptop ones) on the "cooling HAT" could extract the hot air above the CPU and send it to one side, allowing a lower space between those stacked boards.

Well, the PoE HAT could do this, but it'd need a cut down version without the PoE bit and just the fan and fan control circuitry.

I believe thats called the Pimoroni Fan SHIM
https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/fan-shim
But you'll require a header extension and will lose I2S functionality
https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/booster-header

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pi ... ,6219.html

rpdom wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 9:43 am

laurent wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 8:34 am

I think a solution for keeping the CPU cold, while having a HAT attached, is to design a "cooling HAT" between the Pi and the "useful" HAT stacked on to ! A thin blowing fan (like on laptop ones) on the "cooling HAT" could extract the hot air above the CPU and send it to one side, allowing a lower space between those stacked boards.

Well, the PoE HAT could do this, but it'd need a cut down version without the PoE bit and just the fan and fan control circuitry.

It's almost that. But the problem with the POE HAT design is the regular fan it uses. It takes the air from above to blow it down to the CPU. The design I think uses a radial blowing fan to take the air flow from the CPU to a side of the "cooling HAT" (and not above or bottom), letting the attached HAT stacked totaly insulated from the CPU's temperature and hot air flow (and keeping this flow optimally extracted).
A control circuitry like in the POE HAT would be very useful for user's ears

Imperf3kt wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 12:06 pm

rpdom wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 9:43 am

laurent wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 10, 2019 8:34 am

I think a solution for keeping the CPU cold, while having a HAT attached, is to design a "cooling HAT" between the Pi and the "useful" HAT stacked on to ! A thin blowing fan (like on laptop ones) on the "cooling HAT" could extract the hot air above the CPU and send it to one side, allowing a lower space between those stacked boards.

Well, the PoE HAT could do this, but it'd need a cut down version without the PoE bit and just the fan and fan control circuitry.

I believe thats called the Pimoroni Fan SHIM
https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/fan-shim
But you'll require a header extension
https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/booster-header

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pi ... ,6219.html

The Pimoroni Fan SHIM is not compatible with I2S HAT (seems due to a shared GPIO), and I'm guessing how efficient could be that shim with a HAT just above.
The header extension is a very good solution (which was already provided somewhere in this forum), it may allow sufficient room to add a heatsink, optimise air flow (provided by a fan or not) and avoid an attached HAT from being fried

Just a quick note on the old case. The Pi4 will fit the older case with removable side panels and lid if you remove / trim the plastic partition around the USB and Network sockets on the lid. The HDMI socket panel can be left off. My Pi4 is using the old case. I have plopped a make shift heatsink on the core and it sits at about 60 degrees C. Functional, not elegant - See Photo ( I also trimmed a bit extra off the lid but that was only for the GPIO access. Either that or ditch the lid.)

For the new official Pi4 case I may drill a hole and thread a masive bolt through the lid of the new case and applying a bit of thermal pad for it to screw down to contact the core...

I am sure there will be lots of fun solutions if you are running hot.

PhilE wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 02, 2019 8:09 am

Following a successful trial with our alpha testers, we are releasing a new firmware build for the USB3 host adapter that should save about 300mW and help the Pi4 to run cooler, which in turn improves performance in compute-intensive tasks.
...

Installed, no issues, minor improvement. Heatsink on order

Montala wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 02, 2019 7:21 am

A Pi 4 specific case is also available for pre-order from Argon ONE at the higher price of $25.00 on https://www.argon40.com/argon-one-pi4.html

That looks like a great case! Did you notice though that it only shows a single, full sized HDMI port on the side? If it's for a Pi4 it would be great if they converted it to full sized ports, via their internal "extensions" it should also have two of them.

Its good that the Raspberry Pi Foundation released a new version in 2019. Its a great little machine.

Having read a few reviews by the time I got around to purchasing a Pi4 I made sure that I also bought a fan.

The Pimoroni fan shim keeps the Pi at around 41 degC when relatively idle. I've seen it rise to 50 DegC when it is under heavy load.

So no throttling, best performance, which is why I bought the Pi4 in the first place to to replace supplement my Pi 3B+.

I appreciate that those using the GPIO header may find the fan option unworkable, but for use as a low power PC its a very satisfactory solution.

The new alpha FW is a no-go. It kills USB performance, with sudden lags and stops. In particular, some media systems like moOde cannot run reliably and mpd stops playing for varying periods of time with the error (in the log)

Jul 10 21:16 : player: Decoder is too slow; playing silence to avoid xrun

See my report of the problems at the thread http://moodeaudio.org/forum/showthread. ... 6#pid11616

Reverting to the shipping version the FW solved the issue.

Roberto

You know, I'd love to see a heat pump solution.
Maybe a small sterling engine powered fan for that steam punk look and the added befefit of the fan's power source being the heat given off by the Pi itself.
Tried this with a TEG to poor results.

Should be self-scaling, the harder the Pi works, the more heat it generates, and the more rotational speed the sterling engine provides to the fan.

If nothing else, it should at least convert some of the heat into kinetic energy, cooling the Pi.

For those unfamiliar, a sterling engine:
http://www.animatedengines.com/ltdstirling.html

I actually used a Pi to plot the Carnot cycles of a Stirling engine.
They go slow enough I was able to use Mathematica.
Probably the shortest bit of Pi code I have ever written.

They are not very good in small sizes, any friction stops them.
You can increase the power output by increasing the gas pressure.
That's how the power generator ones work.

High pressure Helium free piston Stirling?
What is the smallest anyone has made?

TEC might power a flashing LED with a decent circuit?