Good cases for the Pi4?

barbudreadmon

@Weatherby The real problem with pi4 cases is that if you want to make it decent against its competitors, you need a massive overclock (~2Ghz), a massive cooler and an open case. Otherwise, imho, it is barely worth buying since the +100Mhz at stock clock won't help that much for single-threaded software-rendered emulation (which is basically 90% of emulators), and the rpi4 gpu drivers required for hardware-rendered emulation seem only good enough for N64 & DC emulation at the moment.

windg

Metal cases are not creating short circuits problems ?

Darksavior

@Ecks Some people, like myself, don't like to use fans. The flirc case is enough to keep a mild overclock from throttling thanks to the newer firmware. For me, using over_voltage=4, I keep mine at 1950Mhz.

barbudreadmon

@Darksavior said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

I keep mine at 1950Mhz

You can now push it to that freq with a fanless flirc case ? No throttling ? That wasn't possible until recently, right ?

Darksavior

@barbudreadmon It was possible before but temps would hit around 70c maybe an hour in when playing goldeneye. I'd guess maybe another hour until it started to throttle. I don't remember if I was overclocking v3d to 750Mhz but I am now. This was maybe back in August with Lakka.

I haven't thoroughly re-tested with the newer firmware under the same conditions but it does run cooler than before. By how how much, I would need to replay goldeneye again for that amount of time again.

Clyde

@backstander said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

@Weatherby
I would like to get the Argon ONE Raspberry Pi 4 Case:

I just ordered its little sibling, the Argon NEO (edit: official product page). I like its compact size with nevertheless easy access to the GPIO and camera connector. Holding the cover in place by magnetism is another nice feature.

barbudreadmon

@Darksavior What about cpu stress tests ? Not sure n64 emulation is a good test, cpu was never the bottleneck for n64 emulation iirc.

Darksavior

@barbudreadmon I have not tried that. Can you recommend a stress test?

Ecks

@Darksavior said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

@Ecks Some people, like myself, don't like to use fans. The flirc case is enough to keep a mild overclock from throttling thanks to the newer firmware. For me, using over_voltage=4, I keep mine at 1950Mhz.

The ice tower that i am showing there is extreme silent which the only thing you would notice is the RGB and not the sound and i have the fan on the 5v pin as well.

barbudreadmon

@Darksavior said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

@barbudreadmon I have not tried that. Can you recommend a stress test?

https://core-electronics.com.au/tutorials/stress-testing-your-raspberry-pi.html => those tests should load your cpu to 100% and give a better view of temp & throttling

YFZdude

@windg

Any metal case should come with standoffs to keep the case from shorting out the circuitry. If one doesn't you can probably just buy teflon washers, nuts, and screws to do the same job.

Technically, the holes in the board for the screws should be in the ground plane and therefore the screws and nuts need not be teflon, but you definitely want some sort of spacer to keep the board from touching any metal case.

Ecks

@YFZdude said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

@windg

Any metal case should come with standoffs to keep the case from shorting out the circuitry. If one doesn't you can probably just buy teflon washers, nuts, and screws to do the same job.

Technically, the holes in the board for the screws should be in the ground plane and therefore the screws and nuts need not be teflon, but you definitely want some sort of spacer to keep the board from touching any metal case.

Pretty much all of these metal cases has built in stand offs which wouldn't short out the Pi and besides that these companies does test their products before selling it and the only way his Pi would short out if he was making the case himself.

roslof

I've tested so many cases for the Pi-4B. Flirc, Argon, and a whole array of other cases with and without stupidly large cooling.

After all that, the Argon series are fantastic. Both the One and the ~~Nano~~ Neo pull heat to the case (which greatly warms the case -- not a bad thing). Might need to be careful where you put these. Eg. Not in a hot area. Not near papers/flammables. But honestly, they don't get hot to the point of burning.

Both Argon cases have the passive cooling and an active cooling (fan) option, and if you plan on overclocking and running hot for a long duration, I'd recommend getting the fan.

Overall, I'd lean towards the Argon One. While it's bigger and a bit pricier than the Argon Neo, there are a few additional benefits:

The Argon One has vents, so you don't have to remove the cover to fully reap the benefit of active cooling.
The power-switch on the back of the case is excellent. With the installed software, you can shut off power completely to the pi on power-off -- and hit the button to power on. No on-cable switch required.
All cables are redirected to the BACK of the Argon One! Nothing sticking out of the sides like the Pi default configuration.

I have no idea why the Neo ~~Nano~~ has a completely solid lid without air holes. And it's silly to need to remove it's lid to take full advantage of active cooling -- but it is a fine case otherwise.

Most important thing: Install the software and tune the fan settings to your liking. I overclock at 2,000 and run the GPU at 750, and the fan only turns on when I'm running hard math (eg. file compression algorithms). I've had zero trouble running N64, Dreamcast, PSX, PSP.

Clyde

@roslof said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

I have no idea why the Nano has a completely solid lid without air holes. And it's silly to need to remove it's lid to take full advantage of active cooling -- but it is a fine case otherwise.

Well, with the case being one big metal heat pipe to the outside, any air movement may not add any significant amount to the cooling, but on the other hand, would let dust into the case that may coat the Pi's electronics over time, worsening their cooling, actually.

The Neo (not Nano) is optimized for size, silence, and maintenance (no movable parts like a fan). For most applications, the Neo should keep the Pi cool enough to prevent throttling, but for more stressfull applications, an actively cooled case may be the better choice. In the video, an overclocked Neo-cased Pi 4 throttled after 12 minutes in a full-throttle stress test running all cores at maximum, but stayed well under the threshold of 80°C with HD video playback.

BobbyJoe

MagPi issue 90 (https://magpi.raspberrypi.org/issues/90/pdf) did a comparison of a few cases, with a thermal camera and load stress. The Argon One came out top there.

Metal case to radiate the heat away better, built-in fan and scripts you install that spin the fan at three different rates depending on thresholds, and the default below that is for the fan to stay off when it's not needed. Some slight imperfections in manufacture or finish of the case, when mine arrived, but it looks really nice, having the ports all on the back is neat and it's good to know the fan is there. Haven't plugged anything into GPIO yet but the magnetically-attached lid over that is a really slick touch.

One thing to note is that the HDMI port that will output sound is not necessarily the one you're used to from a bare Pi 4; the daughterboard that puts all the ports at the back may confuse your automatic reaction.

roslof

@Clyde the Neo has a fan option. That is what I was referring to. A fan inside the case that requires you to remove the lid to have max benefit.

Neo (left device) with fan + solid lid. Note the vents on the Argon One (right device)

Ranma

Puts me off the Pi 4 a bit, all this need for cooling. I like the idea of a fairly low powered unit not needing much fuss.

roslof

@Ranma not really needed unless you overclock.

Clyde

@roslof That optional fan is interesting, thanks for the picture. I concur that it seems impractical and out of place, and I wouldn't use it myself with the Neo, but rather buy another case if I needed active cooling. Since I don't (I never overclocked my Pi 3 either), I'll stick to the Neo. Without the fan it's just too sleek. 😁

Brunnis

@barbudreadmon said in Good cases for the Pi4?:

@Weatherby The real problem with pi4 cases is that if you want to make it decent against its competitors, you need a massive overclock (~2Ghz), a massive cooler and an open case. Otherwise, imho, it is barely worth buying since the +100Mhz at stock clock won't help that much for single-threaded software-rendered emulation (which is basically 90% of emulators), and the rpi4 gpu drivers required for hardware-rendered emulation seem only good enough for N64 & DC emulation at the moment.

The fact that the Pi 4 is clocked only 100 MHz higher than the Pi 3B+ is irrelevant when you're comparing two entirely different CPU architectures (Cortex-A53 vs Cortex-A72). The software-rendered performance difference between the two at stock clocks is huge. For example, SNES emulation runs twice as fast or more. The GPU drivers appear to be quite fine at the moment, but the GPU hardware itself doesn't appear to be all that much faster than the older VC4 based solution.

As for the Flirc case: I have run some tests with older firmware that had some but not all of the thermal improvements. Running sysbench on four threads at 1800MHz (over_voltage=2) yielded a steady state temp of 72 C.