RE: ESP32Cam -- Software and lighting options
I may just try to order a heatsink if in can find one separately next time I order something on amazon. Should be inexpensive and would be great if it works.
The tricky part is what to attach the heatsink to. Most ESP32 modules have a metallic shield over the core circuit; I don't think the ESP32 chip is thermally coupled to that shield. You would either have to remove the shield to couple a heatsink directly to the plastic chip package, forfeiting its RF certification and possibly making Wifi performance worse. Or maybe there is good thermal coupling between the chip and a copper surface on the PCB, and you could heatsink that?
And then there is the camera chip itself, which has also been reported to be temperature-sensitive. That one is at least freely accessible. But if you have to attach heatsinks to both, the ESP32 (for stable Wifi performance) and the camera chip (for stable images), that makes the physical arrangement a bit tricky.
RE: ESP32Cam -- Software and lighting options
I may just try to order a heatsink if in can find one separately next time I order something on amazon. Should be inexpensive and would be great if it works.
The tricky part is what to attach the heatsink to. Most ESP32 modules have a metallic shield over the core circuit; I don't think the ESP32 chip is thermally coupled to that shield. You would either have to remove the shield to couple a heatsink directly to the plastic chip package, forfeiting its RF certification and possibly making Wifi performance worse. Or maybe there is good thermal coupling between the chip and a copper surface on the PCB, and you could heatsink that?
And then there is the camera chip itself, which has also been reported to be temperature-sensitive. That one is at least freely accessible. But if you have to attach heatsinks to both, the ESP32 (for stable Wifi performance) and the camera chip (for stable images), that makes the physical arrangement a bit tricky.
Ah, thank you for that. I didn't realize this and you saved me a few bucks and some wasted frustration. I'll take it apart and examine it, but I'm by no means an EE so I'll mostly take you at your word. Short of being able to add a heatsink, not much else I can do with it being mounted inside of the Core One case.
RE: ESP32Cam -- Software and lighting options
Here's a teardown video which illustrates the issue. At around 0:30, after the shield has been removed, you can see that the ESP32 is actually not the tallest chip under the shield, and is not thermally coupled to it with any kind of thermal pad. Hence, attaching a heatsink to the shield will not achieve much at all. (Notwithstanding the fact that many vendors offer such heatsinks. Snake oil in my opinion.)
Instead, the bottom side of the PCB shows a square metallic area with many vias. That will be contacted to a corresponding pad on the top side of the board, and to a ground & cooling pad on the bottom of the ESP32 chip. Hence, a heatsink coupled to the bottom side of the PCB would probably be meaningful. But the typical ESP32Cam modules have a carrier board there which gets in the way.