[BPI-R4 PRO] Hardware assembly

Just in time for some weekend fun, I received the BPI R4 PRO case and I thought about sharing some details for the curious folks.

As for size…the case is big. Depth wise is just as deep as the bare motherboard. Lenght is supposed to be able to hold the BE19000 sticking out of the board and then… some more like 2-4cm that I’m plannig to use to mount the two 40x10 side fans designed in the case.

Very cool a bottom hatch that gives direct access to the SSDs slots below the board. That’s nice.

When you assemble the board, it gets like this:

Took me a while to realize that the rail was to hold the front antenna’s connectors so that you can slide in the front but also operate the case open without going mad with short pigtails. Another nice touch.

The BE14000 board I bought was not the v1.1 I was expecting but still has a different build from the ones I bought before. Nasty thing is that the BE14000 came with no heatsink and… more upsetting no (super annoyingly tiny) M2 screws to clamp it to the mainboard. Lucky me, I had a couple spare, if not… you’re in trouble. For the heatsink, I’m trying to find something that will fit, work in progress.

When you screw in the rail, it will look like this… nice to operate open, especially when developing/debugging stuff.

And when you slide in the front cover it look like this, front and back:

Since I mounted both the BE14000 and the RM-520N-GL LTE modem, I decided to mount all the antennas to the front and in order to minimize pigtails connections: the 4 for LTEs then the 3+3 for wifi are kind of a big array. We’ll have to see how that goes for SNR performance.

I’m now waiting for the 2 40x10 fans and a few heatsinks to arrive to close the build.

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Here’s my cooling solution. The case can accommodate more fans. I’m not sure if the 80x10 fan on the left will conflict with the 40x10 fan.

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Oh! Cool! So that’s how the big top 80x10 fan was supposed to be anchored!
I guess you had to split the left fan connection beacuse the right one gets covered by the fan itself?

Very interesting also the the 45x10 fan you used is a blower for the bottom side.
The 70x10 fan screw’s, however, are below the surface of the BE14000 (and the PCI connector), maybe they need some form of raising?

Thanks for the post. Very helpful information, especially the fan mounting ect :slightly_smiling_face:

Did you check if the Wi-Fi noise level has improved vs the original R4?

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Got a couple of side fans and a temporary heatsink for the BE14000 so now it look like this:

Uhm, the antenna array is… mighty massive.
Also the temporary heatsink is already boiling, I need to find something better.

Preliminary SNR readings are… bad… but the BPI official image is kind of an unknown to me.

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unfortunately, the noctua that you picked are quiet but they nearly dont move any air around :-/

would recommend to at least put 80MM with the max CFM from noctua and if possible to put 2 of them so the air should the hell out of there from everywhere :slight_smile:

Yeah, I noticed the same. :face_with_diagonal_mouth: And, yeah, will put a top 80mm one.
I’ll probably try to keep also both 40mm with a splitter and see if that gets me somewhere.

Anyone trying to use the top 80mm fan, be aware that a standard 80x80x25mm won’t fit in height, there’s about 20mm clearance between the stands and the top… (so no noctua… sic…). I’m now looking for a slimmer fan.

The 70x70 box on top of the BE14000 looks like a non standard size for a fan, maybe there’s something specific that is supposed to go there. Also, putting a fan there, will definitely create issues with the SMA connectors screwed on the rail. I’m also looking at the 50x50 stands immediately on the right. They also looks to be dedicated for something specific (BE19000?) but maybe I can put a blower there that points to the BE14000 sink, once I figure out a decent heatsink to use. Still work in progress.

For rm520n-GL modem control

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I’m eager to see the first reviews about power consumption and temperatures of this board.

and wifi noise - i hope its at least a bit better

You can take a look here. The relevant power tests have already been conducted. However, the data is only for reference as the status of each person’s module used may vary. The cooling aspect is still under improvement.

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Thanks :ok_hand:,

very informative!

Got mine mounted to a rack on my desk pi case, I’m hoping I can figure out a cooling solution though

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made similar fan solution:

  • 2x NF-a4x10 5V PWM
  • 1x NF-A6x15 5V PWM
  • 1x splitter NA-SYC1

=>

temp1:        +44.0°C  (high = +120.0°C, crit = +110.0°C)
temp1:        +42.2°C  
temp1:        +42.2°C  
temp1:        +37.0°C  (high = +120.0°C, crit = +110.0°C)
temp1:        +44.0°C  (high = +120.0°C, crit = +110.0°C)
temp1:        +42.2°C  
temp1:        +42.2°C  

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