Pipo X7 internal construction and heat dissipation

[noggin]

Dismantled my X7 to try to get to grips with why video playback of broadcast TV is throttling the CPU and frame dropping like crazy, when the Baytrail CPU/GPU combo should cope fine...

Once you've taken the base plate off (4 standard cross head screws) you can remove the large CPU board (well it's tiny in relative terms!) with another 4 cross head screws.

You then discover a small thin plastic pad stuck to the CPU and other chips. This doesn't conduct heat anywhere - it doesn't touch anything...

It feels to me like a decent heatsink might have been a better idea... Using a laser thermometer the plastic pad is hitting 50C playing video.

Looking at the two PCBs it appears that there is space left for additional USB-style headers to link the two boards with a further connection, and possibly space for two additional front panel components between the USB and Power LED - whether this is for an IR receiver, activity LED or something else I don't know.

What is clear is that the two internal PCBs are very neatly designed and very easy to remove. If someone wanted to make a much smaller unit they could, easily.

If the header that isn't used is a spare USB port - then an internal TV tuner would be a really neat addition too.

[sogoku_vn]

Dismantled my X7 to try to get to grips with why video playback of broadcast TV is throttling the CPU and frame dropping like crazy, when the Baytrail CPU/GPU combo should cope fine...

Once you've taken the base plate off (4 standard cross head screws) you can remove the large CPU board (well it's tiny in relative terms!) with another 4 cross head screws.

You then discover a small thin plastic pad stuck to the CPU and other chips. This doesn't conduct heat anywhere - it doesn't touch anything...

It feels to me like a decent heatsink might have been a better idea... Using a laser thermometer the plastic pad is hitting 50C playing video.

Looking at the two PCBs it appears that there is space left for additional USB-style headers to link the two boards with a further connection, and possibly space for two additional front panel components between the USB and Power LED - whether this is for an IR receiver, activity LED or something else I don't know.

What is clear is that the two internal PCBs are very neatly designed and very easy to remove. If someone wanted to make a much smaller unit they could, easily.

If the header that isn't used is a spare USB port - then an internal TV tuner would be a really neat addition too.

So what would we do ? I found a micro usb header and serial console TX RX in PCB

[robmich]

Interesting Cooling Idea?

It feels to me like a decent heatsink might have been a better idea... Using a laser thermometer the plastic pad is hitting 50C playing video.

So I'm new to the FreakTab community but seems like there are some pretty smart people here... So, how about this.

It appears that Pipo in an attempt to keep the unit quiet and to save some money is using a very poor method of passive thermal cooling. I do not want to pull the plastic cover off the CPU just in case it is really bare silicon. I am looking at a 40mm x 40mm peltier cooling device as a possible solution. The "cool" side can run as low as -50. You would arctic 5(thermal paste) it to the plastic cover. A small aluminum heatsink needs to be on the "heat" side as it gets very hot... The device should suck all the heat out of the CPU and the heatsink would dissipate it.

The cost of the device is 11.00, the heatsink 1.00. I have to determine if the psu has enough juice to run it...

Thoughts?

Rob

[rrileypm]

I'm think about designing a case mod for this device with my 3D printer. Any ideas?

[Finless]

I'm think about designing a case mod for this device with my 3D printer. Any ideas?

A case would be cool to allow a heat sink and maybe even a fan!

But as the picture Neomode posted shows, the CPU has no cover on it! Thus my biggest concern on case modding it attaching a heat sink to the CPU without screwing it up!

While I am super hardware technical, I want my box to live for a little while before I attempt that.

Bob

[no_spam_for_me]

:
You then discover a small thin plastic pad stuck to the CPU and other chips. This doesn't conduct heat anywhere - it doesn't touch anything...
:

I didn't recognized that it is plastic, and yes, you are right, this doesn't conduct heat, BUT keep heat

:
I am looking at a 40mm x 40mm peltier cooling device as a possible solution. The "cool" side can run as low as -50.
:

Not a good idea, because the cool-down of the one side of the peltier generates additional heat inside the case...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoelectric_cooling

[josef]

it´s no problem that there is no heat spreader on the cpu. remember the old AMD CPUs for example.... they also didnt have heat spreaders... be careful a bit but this is not a big problem with a thin and light cooler.

i would simply mount a cooler directly on the cpu using an adhesive heating pad so you can change/remove the cooler later if you want. there are also non-electric thermal adhesives available but i wouldnt recommend.

if this is not enough cooling, then drill a hole in the lid over the cpu and mount a fan that blows the cpu cooler... maybe it´s also possible to only let the fan blow on the cpu without adding a cooler on the cpu. we have to test it.

that is what i do when my pipo arrive. thank god it´s not a meegopad where we cannot mod like this

[buzzbuzz68]

I'm absolutely no expert, but to me 50 degrees doesn't sound that hot, and I would find it strange if that would already cause throttling. I know most CPU's can handle 90 degrees these days. But Since there already is a thermal pad on the metal plate covering the 2 parts, I think the easiest thing would be to remove the plastic part where the thermal pad is and shorten the 4 studs where the screws go in so the thermal pad can be stuck to the casing.

[noggin]

I'm absolutely no expert, but to me 50 degrees doesn't sound that hot, and I would find it strange if that would already cause throttling. I know most CPU's can handle 90 degrees these days. But Since there already is a thermal pad on the metal plate covering the 2 parts, I think the easiest thing would be to remove the plastic part where the thermal pad is and shorten the 4 studs where the screws go in so the thermal pad can be stuck to the casing.

The 50C is the surface temperature of the plastic pad read by a laser thermometer. The CPU temperature sensor is indicating around 82C, and the CPU info screens and logs generated by HWINFO are showing that the CPU core speeds are reducing as the temperature increases and then thermal throttling is indicated.

Sadly you can't do as you suggest to get the heat pad to touch the metal chassis, as the Ethernet, USB and HDMI ports are on the same side of the circuit board as the heat pad - so even if you reduced the height of the stand-offs a bit you'd still have to allow for the height of the board connectors. The Ethernet connector is much taller than the heat pad so would touch the case long before the heat pad did.

Also the stand offs are part of a metal-look plastic inner bracket, so even if you could somehow get the heat pad close enough it wouldn't actually touch the case, it would touch the plastic bracket skeleton.

Interestingly the tear down of the Minix Neo Z64 shows it has a metal heatsink screwed onto the CPU... It's in a smaller box with no obvious air flow holes though...

[noggin]

I'm thinking something like this might improve things?

http://www.frozencpu.com/products/18195/vid-206/Aavid_Thermalloy_Low_Profile_Chipset_Heatsink_w_3M-8810_Adhesive_-_27mm_x_27mm_x_5mm_-_Anodized_Black.html

Possibly a slightly bigger area one ?

[no_spam_for_me]

Yes, I think so too (better than nothing ), and if you take a bigger one, worst case you have to modify it to avoid conflicts with the other parts at the pcb...

http://www.freaktab.com/showthread.php?22178-I-have-to-say!-I-freakin-love-this-box!&p=273425&viewfull=1#post273425

[goujam]

I just had a look at the zotac zbox pi320 which is simular to the x7 but uses the z3735f cpu and they have a metal heatsink connected to the cpu via rubber conductors see the link to a review of the zbox with pictures of the board

http://www.thessdreview.com/our-reviews/zotac-zbox-p1320-mini-pc-review-and-teardown/2/

[noggin]

Yes, I think so too (better than nothing ), and if you take a bigger one, worst case you have to modify it to avoid conflicts with the other parts at the pcb...
http://www.freaktab.com/showthread.p...l=1#post273425

It does look as if there are possibly two spare PCB holes to screw on a heartsink doesn't it? They are smaller than the screws that hold the chassis on?

[noggin]

I just had a look at the zotac zbox pi320 which is simular to the x7 but uses the z3735f cpu and they have a metal heatsink connected to the cpu via rubber conductors see the link to a review of the zbox with pictures of the board

http://www.thessdreview.com/our-revi...nd-teardown/2/

Yep - looks like the Minix and the Zotac both have metal heatsinks...

[goujam]

Yep - looks like the Minix and the Zotac both have metal heatsinks...

I wonder if simply cutting out a metal sheet and applying it to the current pad would help. The zotac part simply has a metal plate that sits on top of the cpu and memory its attaching the plate to the cpu thats the problem, they seem to use some rubber.

Seeing as the pipo has a aluminium case you could drill some holes and tap them to pull the plate down