Raspberry Pi 4 Heavy-duty Aluminum Case P173

It's a fine little kit, and it is priced right. I used the included copper shim and some Arctic Silver instead of the thermal pad for the CPU. It seems to have the right amount of squish on the thermal interfaces to keep everything held together and smoosh things out appropriately. All of the thermal pads (there are two sets of 4) were cut to the right shapes, and had protective plastic on both sides which must be removed for optimal performance. One extra screw is included, along with an Allen key for tightening the screws. It cools the CPU, the RAM, the PMIC, and the USB 3 hub chip. No provision is included for cooling the Wifi chip, but none is needed or useful (and on the Pi4's PCB, the metal can covering the wifi chip doesn't actually touch anything that gets warm anyway -- there is nothing to cool here, by nature of the Pi4's design. The can improves RF interference and light sensitivity vs the Pi3B's design, which used a similar chip but as a bare unprotected silicon die). I wanted a better cooling solution for a Pi4 (I'm going on a adventure that is going to include using a Raspberry Pi on battery power while camping in the Florida sun), and I'm allergic to using noisy fans for such low-power applications. This will work great: It uses zero energy and offers wonderful thermal dissipation -- more than plenty to dump the Pi4's maximum heat output of around 6.4 Watts. In its present duty, running Kodi with LibreElec on the living room TV: It works fine. No issues. Reported temperatures while watching a film in a 68-degree room with minimal airflow are around a very-chill 31C, which is 49 degrees below the throttle temperature (and 54 degrees below the maximum allowable operating temperature) of the Pi4. I could overlock it and put the hammer down, but meh: Provisions are made for running the GPIO out with a 40-pin ribbon cable, if tinkering is in order. The finish is a nice, semi-matte black. It was consistent on the unit I ordered. One star deducted because the screws were more difficult to get started than I anticipated. It's a little bit unnerving holding the case closed with one hand (to keep the thermal interfaces where they need to be) and starting screws with my other hand. A little bit of a chamfer would completely resolve this issue, but I shouldn't have to add that myself. It would also be more-ideal if the aluminum posts molded into the top-half of the case were unpainted where they contact the parts being cooled. They're beefy and solid aluminum, and that's quite good, but the main goal of a case like this is to conduct heat and paint gets in the way of that goal.

I really like the looks and simplicity of this pi case, utilitarian and clean, fits the pi perfectly. Good quality aluminum, keeps the pi cool without needing any fans.

This case fits PERFECTLY for a typical Raspberry Pi 4B project. Please note you won't fit any hats or other add-ons in there, but it looks great, and works just fine. The SD card can be a little tricky to pull out if you don't have needle nose or tweezers, but you still have access, at least. Zero fan, so ZERO noise with the passive cooling options. It's easy enough to install onto your pi, but getting the thermal pads onto your pi itself is the tricky part. I'm not sure about what other models fit, but the 4B is perfectly compatible.

Very easy to assemble and built with quality. I chose to use the thermal pads and it's barely even warm after 24 hours of use. Built to last meaning it's extremely durable. Cooling has been excellent and it's small enough you can put it out of the way from prying eyes. So far it's definitely exceeded my expectations. Visually it looks pretty cool also. I had mine completely assembled within 3- 5 minutes and I have zero experience with Pi hardware. Yes, it's truly that easy.

Bought this case as a means to house a Pi4 for my 3d printer, and I went with this one since the entire case allows for passive cooling VS needing a fan. Pros: Simple, robust design. Hefty, so it has plenty of mass and won't get knocked around easily. This also means there's a lot of material and surface area to help dissipate heat. Cons: The biggest drawback I've found for this case is the inability to remove the micro SD card without using needle nosed pliers. The opening is too narrow to get a grip unless you have half-inch long nails. This is the reason for a 4-star vs 5. Another minor con is a lack of any mounting solutions. Simple tabs on the corners or cheap brackets to clamp over the case would be nice, but not so much a 'con' as it's just a slight inconvenience. This is a great Pi case and I recommend it, just be aware of its limitations so that you know it will work for your use-case.

TL;DR: Excellent case for the money, great performance for a simple Home Assistant dashboard, and silent. Use Case: I am currently using a Raspberry Pi to run a Home Assistant dashboard in my office. I was using a different heatsink with a small fan. The fan would turn on periodically throughout the day and became quite distracting for the few degrees improvement it caused, compared to if it stayed off entirely. I experimented with a handful of cases and heatsinks until I eventually landed on this item. Wow, to say the least. It brought my temperatures down from 55-60 to 35-40. All of this without the use of a fan. No complaints and I'm glad I landed on this product. Build Quality: Feels sturdy and no complaints. The paint has some blemishes, but nothing that detracts overall from its look and performance. The product does come with a copper plate for covering the CPU. Per the instructions provided, I applied thermal paste on both sides of the copper plate and then only put the smaller thermal pads over the three other chips. Performance: Excellent. The CPU temperatures exceeded my expectations and it's silent. The entire case is made out of metal, so the case does transfer heat from the Raspberry Pi. For my use case, this isn't a problem. It's just slightly warm to the touch, and still cooler than any laptop bottom would be after a few hours of use.

Completely metal and I can feel the whole thing warming up so I know it's working. Easy to assemble and I didnt even need to unplug the Pi which is nice. Obviously quiet since there's no fans.

Excellent refroidissement. Test sur Raspberry Pi 4B avec "stress-ng" : Avant de lancer, température idle à 35 °C, Après 5 minutes de stress-ng : ça ne dépasse pas les 40 °C. Je recommande, ça vaut largement mieux qu'un ventilateur et en plus sans bruit.

I was sceptical about this just being heat-soaked after time but it really works. I used the thermal pads to cover the parts on the Pi and it's doing a great job. Running stress for ~10 minutes and it kept the pi temps very reasonable (upto 54C when the pi can operate higher than that). Running a compile on it for some connected ESPHome kit and the temps are sitting at 40-45C. It's solid, sturdy, looks great, easy to assemble and not overly expensive. Doesn't cause issue with any connections. Good bit of kit

Prima

Solid look, physical protection of my RPi 4B, good fitting of heat sink, getting a little hot though. Using it after removing case with fan because it became too noisy.

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