Take your Pi 5 to the next level!

our shiny new Raspberry Pi 5 is the fastest flagship Pi ever. But can we Y make it a little better? Sure we can, we just need to overclock it, boot from USB and make sure that it is adequately cooled. In this tutorial, we will overclock the Pi 5 and show you how to install the new Raspberry Pi OS to a USB 3 drive. We’ll also pass on a few pearls of wisdom from our weeks of testing and using the latest Pi.

Cases and cooling

The official Raspberry Pi 5 case looks pretty much like the Raspberry Pi 4 model, except for the Ethernet port being switched to the other side of the USB ports, and the new case has built-in cooling. Yes, the Raspberry Pi 5 needs cooling. It can run without it but you will soon encounter CPU throttling. The official case has a tiny fan to blow cool air over the CPU, Wi-Fi and the new RP1 chip. It connects to the new fan connector, meaning that it has full access to the GPIO. We’ve got a case on order, as well as Pimoroni’s new Pibow Coupe case for the Raspberry Pi 5.

For the best cooling, you will want to spend the extra £5 and pick up the Official Active Cooler. Looking resplendent in anodised aluminium, this cooler has a heatsink and active fan that connects to the CPU, Wi-Fi and RP1 chip via thermal pads. Held in place using new mounting holes in the Pi 5 PCB, the active cooler connects to the fan power connector. This fan cools extremely well and stays relatively quiet. We tested the original Pi 4 case fan and it sounded like tinnitus. The active cooler is quiet and only ramps up the speed when it really needs it. At the time of writing, the official case and the active cooler are the only known cooling products for the Raspberry Pi 5. Reusing Raspberry Pi 4 coolers and cases will be problematic, largely down to the placement and removal of ports on the Pi 5. The composite jack has been removed and we now have two camera/screen connectors in its place. The USB and Ethernet ports have been swapped to