Machined backplate for proper CM5 cooling
A one-off machined metal backplate with a real heat path to the CM5, floated as a possible group buy at around $250.
What it takes
- Purchase required
- Disassembly
Difficulty 2 of 3 — moderate.
Details
philosiraptor machined a replacement backplate with an integrated heat path for the CM5 after finding nothing off the shelf. It took a long time on hobby tooling, and the thread floats a group buy if there is enough interest — so treat it as a design to watch rather than a part you can order today.
Links
Open at Forum threadRelated mods
Two layers of 0.5 mm thermal pad and a small aluminium heatsink on the CM5 SoC, held with thermal tape — about 10 °C cooler under load.
A CM4 socket protection adapter lifts the CM5 so a 0.5 mm pad reaches the back shell instead of the thick stock pad.
Replace the ~4 mm stock pad, which is sized for the A-06, with a thinner high-quality pad or paste that matches the real CM4/CM5 gap.
The adapter board's PWM fan header runs a Raspberry Pi, Waveshare or EDATEC CM5 cooler; printed back covers make the room.
A cheap magnetic gaming-phone cooler clipped to the aluminium back pulls heat out of the whole console when a CM5 is working hard.
hack2you's machined cooling pad for the compute module, sold on Tindie alongside the trackpad keyboard and NVMe modules.