RPI 4 - broken twice

[Adiq]

Hi,

I had one Raspberry PI 4, but returned it on warranty. It was "freezing" for some time on regular basis, once every few days and required reboot. Finally, it stopped to read microSD cards, green LED blinked 4 times.
I received replacement, it worked fine for few days, but same problem started to occur, freezes that required reboot and now it won't boot, there's solid light from red and green LED. Tried to re-flash image to microSD card, tried another card, tried recovery.bin, but RPI won't read it.
I use original RPI 4, 5.1V/3A power supply, it is connected to ethernet, external HDD with USB3 and there's fan, NOCTUA NF-A4X20 5V/100mA connected to 4 and 6 pin on GPIO. I measured voltage between some test points on board and it shows 5.25V, so within correct range.
Temperatures were ok (~40-50°C), Raspberry was on 24h, Kubernetes on Raspbian was running on it with some small, constant load.

Bad luck and I should ask for another replacement or do I do something wrong that leads to this failures?

[DougieLawson]

I'd start by assuming one or more of devices you're connecting to the GPIOs are shooting your RPi4 dead (which means it's shouldn't be eligble for a warranty replacement).

[Adiq]

There's only fan connected to GPIO. I checked it with multimeter and it's drawing about 80mA on 5V pin, so about 0,4W.

[DougieLawson]

Then the other cause is going to be a weedy power supply that can't deliver a steady 3A @5.0V (up to 5.25V).

Get the official RPF power supply. That's known to work.

[Adiq]

I use official one: https://www.raspberrypi.org/products/ty ... er-supply/ , there's small heatsink on CPU and official case with drilled holes to mount fan:

[B.Goode]

There's only fan connected to GPIO. I checked it with multimeter and it's drawing about 80mA on 5V pin, so about 0,4W.

But you said in your original post:

I use original RPI 4, 5.1V/3A power supply, it is connected to ethernet, external HDD with USB3 and there's fan, NOCTUA NF-A4X20 5V/100mA connected to 4 and 6 pin on GPIO.

If you decide to try again I suggest you 'confidence test' the board for a while with nothing other than the microSD card and power supply. (And keyboard/mouse/display if you need them.)

[aBUGSworstnightmare]

What are those wires for that come out of the case?

[jerrm]

Have you tested the drive/usb adapter performance?

I've tested adapters that appear to work at first but eventually hang. There should be some indication of this in the logs though.

The best test I've found to cause a failure is bonnie++. The "rewriting" phase of the benchmark breaks bad controllers. If so, disabling uas with the quirks option as shown in the sticky should get things working:

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get install bonnie++
sudo bonnie -u root -d /mnt/path/to/sdd

Also as suggested above, thoroughly bench test the unit. There was a point 25%+ if the Pi3's we bought failed the memtester portion of our bench tests.

[ejolson]

Have you tested the drive/usb adapter performance?

I've tested adapters that appear to work at first but eventually hang. There should be some indication of this in the logs though.

The best test I've found to cause a failure is bonnie++. The "rewriting" phase of the benchmark breaks bad controllers. If so, disabling uas with the quirks option as shown in the sticky should get things working:

Code: Select all

apt-get install bonnie++
sudo bonnie -u root -d /mnt/path/to/sdd

Also as suggested above, thoroughly bench test the unit. There was a point 25%+ if the Pi3's we bought failed the memtester portion of our bench tests.

Have you described the entire set of bench tests anywhere? I would like to further check my Pi 3.

Back to the original topic, those wires that connect the fan are far too long. While it may not be related to your problem, it might be better to run the fan from a separate power supply with the next Pi. Given the minimal requirements, the fan could be powered by any spare USB charger you have lying around.

[mahjongg]

The SoC (main chip) needs are flow over it, not just a heightened air pressure over it, so where can the air blown into the case escape, to create a flow of air?

In other words, where did you drill the holes that allow the air to escape? Without those you won't get much cooling!

[ejolson]

The SoC (main chip) needs are flow over it, not just a heightened air pressure over it, so where can the air blown into the case escape, to create a flow of air?

In other words, where did you drill the holes that allow the air to escape? Without those you won't get much cooling!

Would the perfect place to drill the extra holes be right through that Raspberry Pi logo on the top? Without additional holes, a raspberry pie will bake in 50 minutes.

Are there any estimates when the swag store will carry an official Raspberry Pi shaped heatsink?

My Pi 4 has now moved to a room where the ambient temperatures are currently above 30C. As soon as I figure out the difficulty with non-connecting gigabit Ethernet, I'll post some heat related measurements.

[mahjongg]

The SoC (main chip) needs are flow over it, not just a heightened air pressure over it, so where can the air blown into the case escape, to create a flow of air?

In other words, where did you drill the holes that allow the air to escape? Without those you won't get much cooling!

Would the perfect place to drill the extra holes be right through that Raspberry Pi logo on the top? Without additional holes, a raspberry pie will bake in 50 minutes.

That would be one possibility, but as the maximum effect is rendered when the air flows over the whole PCB (which itself acts as a heatsink, due to the close thermal coupling it has to the SoC, its why the metal connectors get warm in the first place) I would place air exit holes around the edges of the PCB, just above the level of the chips on the board.

Oh, and by the way "bake in 50 minutes" sounds worse than it probably should, as silicon is not bread! you probably refer to the temperature where the RPI lowers its clock speed to prevent a further rise in temperature.

The RPI will never gets so hot, that its electronics would fail. I would however be careful with touching the metal parts that get hot, so don't touch the SoC when it displays the overheating icon, just as you would not touch any chip in a PC when its running.

[castletonroad]

Official raspberrypi 4 case is effectively useless as sold, IMO.

I've now got my 2GB version up-and-running headless, as a Nextcloud server and postfix/dovecot mail server.

Just idling away it's running at 81 degC; I took the top part of the case off, and it now runs at 66 degC.

Even if I were to add a heat-sink, the case has no real openings to speak of to allow an air flow. Think I will look to pick up a case with a built-in fan, or maybe a case like my Pimoroni one for my pi3, which leaves the components largely open to the air.

I have three raspberry pi computers now, with several official accessories, and I must say, this pi4 case is a real disappointment.

[DougieLawson]

The £16/$16 Flirc case looks the best if heat is your problem.
https://flirc.tv/more/raspberry-pi-4-case
https://thepihut.com/products/flirc-raspberry-pi-4-case

The case is the heatsink.

[bls]

The £16/$16 Flirc case looks the best if heat is your problem.
https://flirc.tv/more/raspberry-pi-4-case
https://thepihut.com/products/flirc-raspberry-pi-4-case

The case is the heatsink.

I thought the Flirc case looked awesome and ordered one. I don't think I screwed up the installation of it (since there isn't much to install!), but I did use the thermal pad that came with it instead of opting for a perhaps higher quality extra pad.

Booted up the Pi4, and it was lovely, until I looked at the temp (55F), and felt the case (VERY warm). I'm now using C4Labs cases with the fan connected to the 3.3V pin and seeing temps between 40-45F depending on the ambient room temperature.

And my Flirc case is sitting there empty and lonely.

[wildfire]

I think you've got Fahrenheit and Celsius mixed up. Running a Pi at 55F (<13C) should not be an issue for anyone and your case would feel cold if anything.

ETA: Even 55C won't be an issue.

[bls]

I think you've got Fahrenheit and Celsius mixed up. Running a Pi at 55F (<13C) should not be an issue for anyone and your case would feel cold if anything.

ETA: Even 55C won't be an issue.

You're right, of course. Those Fs should have been Cs. And I know 55C isn't an issue, but the Flirc case was quite warm. Probably OK, but warmer than I was comfortable with.

[Mikael]

You're right, of course. Those Fs should have been Cs. And I know 55C isn't an issue, but the Flirc case was quite warm. Probably OK, but warmer than I was comfortable with.

Since the whole point of the Flirc case is to act as a heatsink, it’s literally supposed to get hot. The hotter it gets, the better, since it means the thermal transfer from the SoC to the case is working as it should. That heat you feel when you touch the case is heat that has been transported away from the SoC, which is exactly what you want.

[castletonroad]

The point of my earlier post in this thread was about the complete unsuitability of the official pi4 case to perform.

I can't imagine any scenario (other than operating in an Antarctic environment) where the pi4 is being used meaningfully that wouldn't see it heat up to 80+ degC, and potentially start thermally throttling.

[HawaiianPi]

I thought the Flirc case looked awesome and ordered one. I don't think I screwed up the installation of it (since there isn't much to install!), but I did use the thermal pad that came with it instead of opting for a perhaps higher quality extra pad.

Did you peel the plastic off of both sides of the thermal pad?

Booted up the Pi4, and it was lovely, until I looked at the temp (55C), and felt the case (VERY warm).

You do realise that a heatsink getting "VERY warm" is a good thing, right? If it wasn't getting warm, THEN you should be worried.

Assuming you meant 55C, that's fine (well below throttling temperature).

And my Flirc case is sitting there empty and lonely.

What a shame to waste a perfectly good case like that.

[bls]

I thought the Flirc case looked awesome and ordered one. I don't think I screwed up the installation of it (since there isn't much to install!), but I did use the thermal pad that came with it instead of opting for a perhaps higher quality extra pad.

Did you peel the plastic off of both sides of the thermal pad?

Booted up the Pi4, and it was lovely, until I looked at the temp (55C), and felt the case (VERY warm).

You do realise that a heatsink getting "VERY warm" is a good thing, right? If it wasn't getting warm, THEN you should be worried.

Assuming you meant 55C, that's fine (well below throttling temperature).

And my Flirc case is sitting there empty and lonely.

What a shame to waste a perfectly good case like that.

Yep, peeld off both plastics, and yes, 55C is well below throttling temperature, but it just "felt warm"...a little too warm for my liking. I don't think it will sit empty forever. I'll eventually get another Pi4 and it will undoubtedly end up in there. It won't be my only Pi4 so I'll be OK with having it run warmer. I'm sure you're enjoying rolling your eyes over this , and I agree it's a perfectly good case.

OK, I'm going back to hacking Python now.

[HawaiianPi]

The point of my earlier post in this thread was about the complete unsuitability of the official pi4 case to perform.

Yea, it is kind of surprising that case design was thought to be a good idea. It's basically a hot air enclosure that traps heat above the PCB. If it had been made with ventilation holes or slots, at least it would let some of the heat out. Would have been nice if they had included ventilation, and a punch-out for a fan.

I thought about getting one and adding a fan myself, like Adiq (along with some vent holes), but then I discovered the pre-order for the Flirc, and realised I could also re-use my old 2 layer acrylic cases, which have no sides (so the port differences don't matter). I had a couple left-over after moving Pi3s into Flircs, and those 2 layer cases work great, with no heatsink needed (the fan keeps things nice and cool all by itself).