Raspberry Pi 5 is a fantastic SBC, but it could have been even better

Key findings

  • The Raspberry Pi 5 is a phenomenal SBC, but it also has its flaws.
  • Stock issues marred the Raspberry Pi 5 launch, but availability has improved. Thermal issues, however, remain a major problem.
  • Despite cross-generational improvements, the Raspberry Pi 5's outdated processor and high price are disappointing.



If you've been reading my articles on XDA, you've probably noticed that I'm a fan of Raspberry Pi boards. The Raspberry Pi Zero W was my first foray into the world of SBC computing, and the Raspberry Pi 5 is by far the best SBC I've used to date.

But after spending months building projects with the Raspberry Pi 5, I'm now seeing a few glaring issues. As much as I love the little device, it's time to talk about all the issues with the newest and greatest member of the Raspberry Pi family.

5 The start was marred by stock problems

Consider yourself lucky if you could get one before 2024

A Raspberry Pi 5 on a Gigabyte Aorus AC300W case


One thing that hasn't changed from the older RPi boards is that the Raspberry Pi 5 was just as hard to buy at launch as its predecessors. If you're someone who tried to get hold of the board last year in 2023, I can relate to your pain. I had to constantly refresh the Raspberry Pi 5 pages at every local retailer for days before I managed to get hold of one in November 2023.

Fortunately, the stock issues have now been somewhat resolved and it is possible to buy a Raspberry Pi 5 from CanaKit, SparkFun Electronics, Adafruit and a few other retailers. Well, the key word here is a couplebecause it is still being sold at exorbitant prices on Amazon.

4 The thermals are absolutely terrible

Make the Active Cooler a must-buy

Even before the Raspberry Pi 5 was released, the company behind the device had started producing accessories such as an “Active Cooler” and a power supply for the SBC. Having spent a lot of time with older Raspberry Pi models, I wasn't sure if I should buy a cooling solution for the RPi 5. After all, a miniature board can't possibly generate a lot of heat, right?


Much to my regret, the thermal issues of the device were so bad that I had to order the Active Cooler in the middle of reviewing the device. Since then, the cooler has become a part of the device. In fact, I only took it off at the end of January to check the thermal performance of my Raspberry Pi emulation box. Although my ambient temperature was 9 °C, the Raspberry Pi 5 reached 87 °C Persona 3: Portable. If this was the temperature trend when running a PSP game, then I shudder to think what would happen if I tried to run a PS2 or Switch title without a cooling solution.

3 It should support hardware encoding

Mini PCs are still the better choice for media servers

A lifestyle picture of the Raspberry Pi 5


When rumors about the Raspberry Pi 5 started circulating, I was pretty excited about turning it into a media server. After all, the Raspberry Pi 4 had acceptable hardware coding, so I assumed its successor would be comparable to the cheapest mini PCs in terms of coding workloads. I was wrong.

Although the Raspberry Pi 5 is better at software encoding than its predecessor, the hardware encoding is completely different. For some reason, the Raspberry Pi Foundation decided to omit the H.264 hardware decoder from the RPi 5. What's really annoying is that the older mainline boards, including the very first version of the SBC, came with an H.264 decoder! Not only did this shatter my dreams of AV-1 hardware support, but I also had to make do without an H.264 decoder.

2 The RPi 5 processor was five years old at the time of its release

The Raspberry Pi 5 is powered by outdated hardware


Before writing my Raspberry Pi 5 review, I used it daily for a week. Aside from gaming, my daily computing tasks include writing articles, editing images, and a bit of programming. The ARM Cortex-A76 in the SBC worked well for the most part, and I had no issues working on the device – even at 4K resolution.

However, the processor is still five years old and is starting to show its age. So things started to fall apart as soon as I switched to anything remotely demanding. When playing videos on YouTube, there were a lot of frames so I had to reduce the resolution to 1080p. Playing Steam games after installing the app was no better. I wouldn't complain about the processor if the SBC wasn't so expensive. Speaking of price…


1 It is far too expensive

Weren’t the cheap boards the selling point for Raspberry Pi?

With a starting price of $60, the Raspberry Pi 5 can no longer be considered a cheap SBC. Of course, you can argue that the 4GB variant of the Raspberry Pi 4 had the same launch price. But by removing an affordable 2GB version, Raspberry Pi boards have gone from being cheap SBCs that you can buy and tinker with at will, to small boards that are only slightly cheaper than entry-level NUCs.

And that's not all you need for the SBC. If I were to start with a 4GB Raspberry Pi 5 board, I would buy at least two 64GB microSD cards, an Active Cooler, and a micro HDMI to HDMI cable to set it up. That would cost me about $112, and we haven't even considered the official 5V/5A power supply or a case for the SBC!


Raspberry Pi 5: Many improvements, but also some disadvantages

A Raspberry Pi 5 held in front of a PC

Aside from these complaints, I have a few other personal annoyances with the SBC. The lack of an AUX port is pretty annoying; I would rather have full-size HDMI ports or USB Type-C ports instead of micro HDMI jacks. The lack of 2.5G Ethernet also becomes apparent when you try to use the Raspberry Pi 5 as a NAS.

Still, I have to give the Raspberry Pi Foundation its due credit. The power button and RTC module are great additions to the RPi 5, and the same goes for the PCIe interface. It supports NVMe SSDs and can run dual monitor setups with 4K resolution and 60Hz refresh rate. It's also the most powerful Raspberry Pi board to date. When you factor in the talented community that churns out exciting projects on a daily basis, the Raspberry Pi 5 is a clear recommendation for both newbies and veterans.


A render of the Raspberry Pi 5

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