Raspberry Pi 4: The Raspberry Pi Foundation brushes off that the RPi 4 has a temperature problem

The Raspberry Pi 4 has been a runaway success, right? Its launch took the internet by storm, and the Raspberry Pi Foundation has been quick to roll-out a firmware update to address any early teething problems. Unfortunately, that does not tell the whole story, nor does the Pi Foundation come out well from it.

Previously, CNX Software noted that the Raspberry Pi 4 would thermal throttle during multi-core tasks, but the Pi Foundation promptly issued a USB firmware update that reduced SoC core temperatures by around 4 °C, a healthy reduction that minimised throttling.

However, there remains a huge thread on the Raspberry Pi Foundation's troubleshooting page entitled "Raspberry Pi 4 temperature", which currently has over 250 posts. While this is not necessarily worrying, but the manner in which the Pi Foundation dismissed one person's concerns about the company's claims of the RPI 4's capabilities as "concern trolling" is.

You can find a link to the original post and response by a Raspberry Pi Engineer here, with the latter adding:

If the Pi4 does not fit your use case, don't use it.

The main issue is that the RPi 4 cannot maintain its peak performance without an active cooler. Moreover, the SBC is incompatible with USB 3.1 Gen1 or newer electronically marked (e-marked) Type-C cables. These cables being incorrectly identified the RPi 4 as an audio accessory and will not supply power to the device, forcing people to find alternative cables.

We are not writing the Raspberry Pi 4 off as a failure, far from it. It pushes the industry on and forces competitors to reduce their prices. However, it is unfathomable that the Pi Foundation did not care to mention that the RPi 4 will only work with certain types of Type-C cables or that only attaching an active cooler will stop the SBC from thermal throttling during multi-core tasks.