In 2020, we wrote about the DeskPi Pro enclosure for Raspberry Pi 4 with 2.5-inch HDD/SSD bay, full-sized HDMI ports, and a PWM fansink as an alternative to the popular Argon One case that also brings all ports to a single side and improves cable management.
The company informed us of a new low-cost model, the DeskPi Lite, with a more compact design since it lacks the 2.5-inch SATA bay, and two extra USB ports at the front which may be convenient to connect USB flash drives or anything that may be temporarily connected to your Raspberry Pi 4.
DeskPi Lite features:
- All main ports on the rear panel:
- USB Type-C power input
- 2x full-size HDMI ports
- AV port (CVBS + stereo audio)
- 2x USB 3.0, 2x USB 2.0, and Gigabit Ethernet ports directly from the Raspberry Pi 4 SBC
- Font panel ports/features:
- 2x USB 2.0 ports
- 2s status LEDs
- MicroSD card socket
- Power button
- Access to the 40-pin GPIO header from the side panel
- Cooling – Heat Sink with PWM fan
- Other features – Programmable power cut-off, always-on switch (Enable/Disable)
- Materials – Plastic enclosure, CNC alloy aluminum heat sink
The enclosure looks nice to me with all main ports on the rear panel, two extra USB ports, and you should never have to open the case after installation as the MicroSD card and GPIO expansion header are available without having to disassemble the enclosure. DeskPi Lite is using the same driver to control the PWM fan as the DeskPi Pro, and you’ll find it on Github.
You won’t be limited to Raspberry Pi OS (32-/64-bit), as the company also prepared various installation scripts, and tested the driver with Ubuntu Mate (32-bit), Ubuntu (64-bit), Manjaro OS (32-bit), Manjaro OS (64-bit), Kali-linux-arm OS (32-bit), Twister OS v2.0.2 (32-bit), DietPi (64-bit), Volumio OS Version 2021-04-24-Pi (32-bit), and RetroPie OS (32-bit). It does not appear to work in Windows. Considering the size of the heatsink, the fan may not be triggered very often, but obviously, it will depend on the ambient temperature and workload.
Pricing is also pretty good at $29.99 for the basic kit with one DeskPi Lite case, the heatsink, PWN fan, GPIO adapter board, a port adapter board, six thermal pads, two LED indicator lampshade, two M2.5 screws, and a user manual. There are also other kits with a power supply, MicroSD card, cables, and/or a Raspberry Pi 4 board.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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