Rpi4 kits recommendations

Hello,
Planning to get on board with rpi and elk, any recommendations for kits? Do I need heatsink / fan or bare one is fine?
How about https://www.okdo.com/p/okdo-raspberry-pi-4-4gb-model-b-starter-set/ ?
Thanks!

Hi @ilionic,
you definitely want to use some sort of heatsink on the Pi4 as it gets very hot!

Even if you set the CPU speed to the minimum (600 MHz), you will still need a small heatsink at least.

The link you posted should work because it seems to have a decent heatsink and fan (if you’re ok with the noise that comes with it), although you won’t be able to use the case that ships with it as clearly the Elk Pi is too big to fit inside.

And I guess the fan would not fit esther with the elk board on top? what setup you recommend from ELK to use with the pi4?

Hi frederic,
some fans might sit on top of the Elk Pi.

It’s otherwise possible to use 40-pin extensions (but mechanically you need to change the support on the other side, too). We were able to install this big heatsink on the Pi4 + Elk Pi:

it fits barely and you need to put some non-conductive material between the heatsink and the Elk Pi.

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ah nice, thanks for the suggestion!
I guess the fan would also need to be discarded if adding the elk pi breakout board on top of the elk pi board :slight_smile:

thanks! looking forward to get my pi4 and be able to retake my work on elk + tracktion engine.

Finally I got my rpi4 with the suggested aluminium heatsink case!

Now I can continue my elk experiments!

I hope a piece of cardboard (from rpi box) like in the picture will work for that right (cutting the necessary bit for the pins to connect of course)?

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That looks really tight to me. By that I mean -> thermal transfer in this case is mostly going to be controlled by the temp difference between the incoming air and outgoing air, and the amount of air that is flowing.

So - if the very well designed aluminum thermal block gets warm, how does it distribute that heat? Through the cardboard into the Elk, and whatever air flow you get around the edge.

I think you’ll be much better off with one of the cheesy small heat sinks and Much Better Airflow - I’m mounting mine in a box and aligning the intake and out-Fan with the heat sink fins. Rpi4 run warm, and above makes the entire elctronic assembly (Pi and Elk) into a single giant thermal mass (with that aluminum heat sink).

Just my 2cents

Yep - This! You need risers.

@AsyncResonance Thanks for your comments. So far it seemed to work fine with my setup, but I have not monitored temp so maybe something bad might happen :S I guess as long as rpi is not doing very intensive tasks then I should be fine? What you’re suggesting is that I should add something like this https://www.adafruit.com/product/4079 to add more air between rpi and elk right?

or I guess even use that https://www.adafruit.com/product/1988 and eliminate heat transfer oroblem?

Hi @frederic - sorry it took so long to get back to you.

I’d recommend getting some of the cheap kits from your favorite vendor. You’ll probably want a riser/header kit (which will contain F->M header strips like the Adafruit link) as well as M->M, 90degs, etc. They are pretty cheap and great to have around. This will let you increase the distance between the Pi and the Elk-hat. Most folks (I am, and AFAIK) are using the smaller, press-on heat sinks which are not as good thermal conductors but provide room for airflow between the two boards.

That aluminum heat sink looks awesome; I am using Elk-hat on a Pi 3 and they are much cooler according to the reports here. To use it you will need a header riser (like you pictured) as well as the standoffs (M2 or M2.5, I can’t recalll, think it’s 2.5) in the same height. So the riser bridges electrical connections, and the matching standoffs (of the same height) bolt onto the support corners for the pi. You can get a brass standoff hardware kit for pretty cheap, it will have multiple heights and bolts and stuff, and some include nylon and /or brass as well.

So those are the two parts to the standoff project. If you need links to any of this let me know. Sorry about the lengthy delay!

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Thanks for your answer! That is more or less what I ended up doing :slight_smile:

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