It is an open secret that popular Raspberry Pi boards tend to get hot when their maximum capacity is being demanded, but it also occurs while at rest. They have registered temperatures above 110 degrees Celsius in the Pi 3 models and above 80 ° at Pi 4.
Various studies carried out by experts have concluded that high temperatures do not put your CPU at immediate risk or decree its technical death, since these levels of heat are part of its nature. However, the problem comes in the prolonged use at this heat level while inside a plastic casing.
What can we do to solve these heating problems? How do high temperatures influence the performance of the small plate? What can you do in a particular way to cool down your Pi? It is part of the questions that we will answer from here on in this guide.
How does overheating affect the performance and durability of my Raspberry Pi?
For users and fans of the brand, seeing the equipment at high temperatures is a source of concern. If we analyze the influence this has on performance, we see that the plate automatically seeks to lower the temperature when it reaches its configured limits. If your CPU stays put for long hours under high load, the Pi tries to lower the levels by sacrificing frequency and performance, in short, it becomes slow to avoid collapse.
Now, we mean durability. One of the heat protection systems that the Pi has is lock up in extreme temperatures. At this point you have to restart it and, If the crashes are very frequent, this ends up affecting the life of the equipment. However, we must emphasize that they are configured to work with high levels of heat, although properly cooling them lengthens their useful life.
What are the main causes of my Raspberry Pi getting so hot?
From Pi3 series on ahead, the unique Raspberry boards have presented as an inescapable characteristic high temperatures. The creators have made some modifications that manage to lower a few degrees of heat, but even that is still insufficient. But What are the high temperatures of these plates due to?
Take a look at the data we have collected:
- Processors: By incorporating more powerful processors, with up to four cores and above 1.5 GHz, performance and power are improved, but also heat up due to higher work and energy demands.
- Regulated voltage: the combination of the voltage that passes through the USB port, with that required by the rest of the components, causes the amount of current needed to heat up the board.
- 4k video playback: the higher the image resolution, the same is the demand that the processor and the memory card make of energy. The components begin to heat up with the passing of the minutes and this temperature is transferred to other components.
- One hundred percent use: When the largest number of programs are executed or the project is very demanding, the card uses 100% of the CPU, which leads to requesting more power load. Here the heat tends to exceed the limits and it is when it regulates itself.
Learn step by step how to fix your Raspberry Pi overheating from scratch
Every problem has a solution and this is the case of the high temperature of the Raspberry Pi board. There are simple and inexpensive tricks that contribute to better performance and to extend the useful life.
We go with two aspects that you must work to cool the Pi quickly:
Improve configuration
In this particular, we are going to update the firmware “000137ab” which prevents the temperature from rising and it also reduces the data transmission of USB 3.0, which helps to enjoy a normal temperature in the Pi4 model.
Take note of the steps to take to successfully upgrade:
- We start with the installation of “rpi-eeprom” to flash memory.
- We take advantage of update Raspberry Pi.
- We install “rpi-eeprom” and “rpi-eeprom-images”.
- After installation, the operating system must be restarted for it to load the update.
- When I start up again We verify that the installed version is “000137ab”. If serial is correct, it means that we have updated properly.
Install heat sink
When purchasing a Raspberry kit, this includes in most cases a pair of heatsinks. What happens is that they do not explain where you should place it, or how to do it. On the other hand, the material of this component matters and you should be clear that aluminum heatsinks are better.
Installing them is not complicated, follow these steps and you will do it successfully:
- Find two of the places where they should be installed; about the processor and over the Ethernet chip.
- Take the heatsink remove the pad underneath and place it over the processor.
- Do the same procedure with the other heatsink.
- Press a little to make sure they are firm.
- Already with these steps, you ensure that you will have a more suitable temperature on your badge.
List of the best heatsink kits to use with your Raspberry Pi from scratch
The users themselves have verified that the installation of a heatsink, combined with a fan, helps to control the temperature of the plate, which means that the processor works at its maximum speed without diminishing performance due to excess heat. There are different viable alternatives at affordable prices that take that headache off of you.
Some suitable kits for the Raspberry Pi are as follows:
Mudder Cooling Kit
This small kit is manufactured by the Mudder company, being an effective solution for overheating. Contains 10 heatsinks in copper and aluminum materials.
Aukru – 3 in 1 Kit
This Aukru kit includes a box that ensures easy assembly and disassembly as well as heatsinks that prevent the board from lowering its performance due to high levels of heat, they are of two different sizes. External grooves in the casing greatly improve aesthetics.
NinkBox Raspberry Pi 4 Kit
This is one of the most complete kits available. This company has designed a set of quality heatsinks that are installed with thermal adhesive on the processor and LAN chip. The creators ensure that lower the temperature up to 20 degrees no need to install an additional fan. In its description, it is reflected that the heat sinks act on the mini computer to prevent it from heating up and causing operating problems.
With any of these kits added to your Raspberry Pi, you will have no reason to worry about the board heating up or that performance will drop if temperatures rise. It’s a bit more of an investment, but The effort is worth it to develop its full potential in future projects.