Raspberry Pi 4 8GB is missing? A youtuber built it himself

The youtuber MadEDoctor has adopted an “artisanal” solution to make up for the scarce availability of Raspberry Pi 4 8GB: he built itor alone. In essence, it replaced the 1 GB memory chip of the homonymous version, much easier to find, with an 8 GB module purchased separately.

But why bother so much? As we reported in late 2022, the Raspberry Pi Foundation he stressed that 2023 would be invested in recovering the rather critical situation left by the Coronavirus pandemic. The last few years have been characterized by the so-called “semiconductor crisis“, marked by a demand exceeding production capacity.

The consequences have also spilled over to the production of Raspberry, which has had to face major difficulties in the supply chain not only of the chips, but also in other sectors, such as the supply of PCBs. Not surprisingly, the company has already anticipated that a Raspberry Pi 5 will not arrive in 2023 as supply uncertainty risks negatively affecting the entire supply chain.

So how do you get an 8GB Raspberry Pi 4 in such tough times? MadEDoctor has decided to buy a RAM memory chip compatible with the platform, more precisely the D9ZCL 8GB manufactured by Micron costing around $20.

It must be said that this is by no means a simple operation, but the right skills and above all the correct instrumentation are required. A. was used for soldering and desoldering the chips hot air station. This is because the module is housed through bg extension (Ball Grid Array), which is why all solder balls will need to be heated for removal.

To preserve the integrity of the PCB, surrounding chips and plastic components the kapton tape. Once the card was prepared, a final job was carried out with which the youtuber first heated the card to 250°C and then concentrated the airflow on the 1GB chip bringing the temperature to 400°C.

Welding takes place in a mirror image. Following the cleaning of the card, the youtuber armed himself with fluxing and then he placed the chip on the joints (the solder balls are already present on the module) and with a thorough heating job he soldered the new chip to the Raspberry Pi 4.

After the operation, he did some tests with memtester to verify that the new memory worked according to the specifications, verifying that everything was perfectly fine. An undoubtedly invasive operation which, of course, void the warranty. In any case, it could prove to be a viable alternative should the search for an 8GB Raspberry Pi 4 prove to be too complex.