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people found this helpful, as of 2023
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out of 571,544,897 reviews
★★★★★
Great kit, but note these specific details:
This is a great kit, and the other reviews cover most of the key points. Here is what I would add that isn't covered elsewhere:
1) About the fan complaints -- it's not a big deal. Yeah, you can hear it, it's not whisper quiet, but it's not noisy either. If the room is silent, then you notice it. The moment there is some other noise (music, TV, talking, etc.) the fan dissapears into the background and is forgotten. The fan stays on when the Pi is off. My bigger complaint is that the "logo" shaped opening for the fan is very small, and doesn't seem like it can supply a lot of airflow. Most of the fan is actually blocked by the plastic case, and is not open. However, it doesn't seem to be harmful, as my Pi4 under "normal" heavy CPU usage (installing software, processing images, etc) maxes around 55C, and idles around 45C, just like all my other, older Pis.
2) The kit comes with micro (male)-to-regular (female) HDMI adapters, not full cables. I really like this option, and it's the main reason I got this kit. I often use old VGA displays, and I can plug my HDMI-to-VGA adapters into these adapters. If they had supplied micro-to-normal (male-to-male) HDMI cables, I couldn't do this. So, just be aware.
3) The case is not the most attractive in my opinion, but is very functional. It's a mostly transparent, but somewhat frosted plastic (not totally transparent). The "top" comes off easily (prefect friction fit) to access the GPIO, camera socket, etc., while the Pi remains in the rest of the case. This is nice. Other cases either can't do this without unscrewing something, or the friction fit is way too tight and you break your fingernails trying to open it.
4) There is no "convenient" opening to bring out the camera cable, GPIO connections, etc., in the top of the case. Instead, there is a thin 1mm gap between the top of the case and the body that goes almost all the way around the perimeter when the top is on, and you need to bring the cables out through that 1mm gap all around the sides. This is "functional" but doesn't look pretty. However, maybe this is a good thing for your application, as nothing ever comes out of the top of the case, only the sides, and you have a lot of control over which side it comes out of.
5) The power switch is also a separate adapter. This is nice, because then you can use the power switch on other USB-C cables, or use other power supplies and "give" them a power switch. Again, another reason why I got this kit.
6) I got the 4GB RAM version, because you never know how you might repurpose your Pi later. However, under most normal tasks, I tend to stay well under 2GB (actually, mostly under 1GB, unless running heavier apps). So if your budget is really tight, 2GB would be a way to save some cash without sacrificing anything, I think. With all the other improvements on the Pi4, I would probably stay away from 1GB if you actually want to use those improvements (dual 4k displays, etc.). If you think you'll only ever need 1 GB, you're probably better of just using one of the Pi3B's, or even earlier, unless you have a specific, exact need for a Pi 4 (e.g. headless operation of USB 3 ports, or something equally specific). I tend to use the Pi4 mostly, because of it's speed, to prototype projects that I then later move to old Pi 1's, 2's, or 3's anyway. But the speed improvement (while coding/compiling, web browsing, etc) is noticeable, even over the 3B+ (but it doesn't seem huge vs. the 3B+).
7) When I play MP3's with ANY media player (VLC, gxine, etc.), they are full of click artifacts (a few per second). This hasn't been a problem on my other Pis. I'm guessing this is just some issue with the Pi4 being so new that media software has not been optimized for it yet. I don't listen to music often on my Pi's anyway, so this isn't a huge deal for me. Again, just be aware.
8) It seems way easier to set up some software on the Pi4 (notably CUPS and Samba). You install it and Bam! it's ready to go. I didn't have to babysit it to get it to work right. Maybe that's just due to the new Buster version of Raspbian being better, I don't know. I haven't run Buster on any of my other Pis.
I hope this review helps!
September 2019 · Electronics · verified purchase