Overheating issues are not exclusive to the computing world. Enthusiasts and photography professionals have experienced firsthand the quirks of various products under thermal stress, and one of the most recent cases is the full-frame mirrorless Canon R5. Its 8K video is excellent, but it only allows 20 minutes of recording in its standard configuration. Matt from the DIY Perks channel decided to explore that limit, and in the process he ended up using watercooling...
Power consumption, battery size, heat dissipation—the list goes on. Every product is a balance of parameters, but if that balance is lost (or worse, never existed from the factory), we as users must intervene. Some take the easy way out and return the product, but others follow the path of modding. Maybe the device is very good and has a single weak point that can be fixed. So, why not do a little surgery...?
Now, I must admit that the latest example from Matt on DIY Perks is a bit... extreme. His Canon EOS R5 is a beast costing 4,600 euros (body only), and one of its main features is 8K RAW video recording at 29.97 FPS. That places it a step above its direct competitors, but the R5 drags a certain detail: it suffers from overheating problems. Under its original firmware, the mirrorless enables a maximum recording of 20 cumulative minutes in 8K, and in the worst case, the user must wait about two hours for the R5 to return to a suitable temperature. What was Matt's response? Watercooling
Unlimited 8K Video on the Canon R5
After partially disassembling the camera, Matt discovered that the processor was covered by two thermal pads that did not make contact with the center of the chip. Additionally, the metal plate is quite small, and above it there's another PCB, trapping even more heat. His first mod is pure brute force: a small copper heatsink, to which he connected two liquid cooling blocks, followed by a custom loop. With all the power of watercooling at his disposal, Matt ran the test... and discovered that the camera's thermal protection is based on time, not temperature.
After several complaints on the web, Canon released a firmware update that changes the monitoring method, but on an unmodified camera, the 20-minute limit becomes 25. The difference is that by combining the new firmware with his watercooling system, Matt managed to record 8K video for more than four hours, without restrictions or warnings on the screen.
Here's where the watercooling adventure ends. The final phase of the mod is to find a solution compact enough to close the R5. Matt chose to replace the original metal plate with a DIY version made of 2mm copper, which has an extension to transfer a little extra heat to the chassis. With this copper heatsink, the new 8K recording limit is 39 minutes (with pauses of only five minutes), but there's one more step: another copper heatsink, installed with a thermal pad on the back of the camera, assisted by a fan. His second variant is a laptop cooler, modified so that cold air hits the back.
With these modifications, infinite 8K video on the Canon EOS R5 is possible, and many comments suggest they should become an 'aftermarket solution' for the mirrorless's overheating issues. Matt closes the video with a question: 'What was Canon thinking?' His hypothesis boils down to a matter of priorities. The R5 is still a photographic camera, and the 8K video function is secondary, but nothing prevented them from designing a more robust thermal solution.
