Raspberry Pi - Who's gonna have a dabble?
Discussion
MesoForm said:
Also got a ZeroW, the plan was to make a solar powered birdbox camera but the first step is soldering the power [something] for the battery onto the board and I haven't soldered anything since school 25 years ago so am putting it off!
Soldering is easy. But then again 40 years ago I did an apprenticeship in electronic assembly 
and spent 15 years building all kinds of stuff.https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/raspberry-pi-4-...
Pimoroni have the 2GB for £70 including power supply, case hdmi cable and sd card. If you dont already have these bits then you will need them anyway.
They seem to have stock of the 1GB today for £60, however I wouldn't bother with that one.
Pimoroni have the 2GB for £70 including power supply, case hdmi cable and sd card. If you dont already have these bits then you will need them anyway.
They seem to have stock of the 1GB today for £60, however I wouldn't bother with that one.
psi310398 said:
dxg said:
I've set up something quite PH'y recently:
In short, I have an old Lupo GTI as a toy summer car. Although not original, it has a single-din Kenwood headunit with a VFD screen - remember those? I *love* them. Because of said screen and the fact that it sounds brilliant, I did not want to get rid of this headunit.
However, I love Android Auto.
So, pi4 (a pi3 just wasn't smooth enough and the cold boot time was too long), with Lineage OS (Android without Google store etc.), a cheap £40 "carlinkit" wired Android Auto / Carplay adapter, the associated Android app sideloaded into Lineage OS, and a 7" touch screen and I've got a *rock solid* Android Auto headunit, which (once I've made the brackets) will hang out the front of the single din cubby immediately under the headunit.
The pi and the android interface will go under the passenger seat with three cables tied together going up to the dash: power/touch; hdmi; aux (to the headunit).
I was having some success using Headunit Reloaded on my phone, but it wasn't stable enough. I also explored Crankshaft but that would have taken too much fiddling; and I didn't fancy paying for OpenAuto (a derivative of Crankshaft); plus it would be nice for passengers to have the Carplay option.
I'll get some pictures together when it goes into the car. Right now, it's a big mess of cables.
But it's rock solid and has had simulated TomTom runs up and down the country with no crashes. Lineage OS even has a safe shutdown option and volume buttons available on the screen, if wanted.
Interesting, thanks. In short, I have an old Lupo GTI as a toy summer car. Although not original, it has a single-din Kenwood headunit with a VFD screen - remember those? I *love* them. Because of said screen and the fact that it sounds brilliant, I did not want to get rid of this headunit.
However, I love Android Auto.
So, pi4 (a pi3 just wasn't smooth enough and the cold boot time was too long), with Lineage OS (Android without Google store etc.), a cheap £40 "carlinkit" wired Android Auto / Carplay adapter, the associated Android app sideloaded into Lineage OS, and a 7" touch screen and I've got a *rock solid* Android Auto headunit, which (once I've made the brackets) will hang out the front of the single din cubby immediately under the headunit.
The pi and the android interface will go under the passenger seat with three cables tied together going up to the dash: power/touch; hdmi; aux (to the headunit).
I was having some success using Headunit Reloaded on my phone, but it wasn't stable enough. I also explored Crankshaft but that would have taken too much fiddling; and I didn't fancy paying for OpenAuto (a derivative of Crankshaft); plus it would be nice for passengers to have the Carplay option.
I'll get some pictures together when it goes into the car. Right now, it's a big mess of cables.
But it's rock solid and has had simulated TomTom runs up and down the country with no crashes. Lineage OS even has a safe shutdown option and volume buttons available on the screen, if wanted.
If you want to tidy all the wiring up and integrate the pi more fully, look at this -
https://www.tindie.com/products/tjd/carpihat-raspb...
I have one I’m experimenting with for one of my classics where I’m gutting a period radio to put in something similar to your setup, probably with a removable screen to keep the looks.
powered by:
velcro'd to the carpet under the passenger seat.
I'm extremely happy with it. In the first few weeks of use, I did hit a few road bumps, namely:
Lots of audio hash over the line-out. I knew this was a problem with the Pi 3, but thought it had been solved with 4, but nope. So I added a little usb sound card and a ferrite bead just in case. Hash is now gone.
Lots of reflections on the screen. Was not expecting that! So, i stuck a cut-down "paper-like" diffused screen protector for an iPad. This helped, but the problem will never fully go away in a car as old as this with such large windows!!
The LineageOS shutdown button turned out to only shutdown the screen, leaving the Pi running. So I got hold of a shutdown app apk and sideloaded it.
At some point, I'll probably sideload TomTom onto the Pi directly, but that would defeat the whole objective for me which was to have Android Auto's nice way of switching back and fore between audio and navigation interfaces (and the much-awaited coolwalk interface).
As that is all I use the headunit for - no phone calls - I experimented with a little usb-power mic which worked just fine, but it's not part of the final "build."
Anyway, this project is now complete and I am extremely happy with the result.
If anyone wants to replicate it, I recommend this screen: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08GCM73MH/
because it has second rear-mounted sockets for HDMI and power/touch - whereas all the other screens I could find all had their hdmi leads going in the side as the only option. Critically, however, this is also the only screen I could find with a brightness control for night driving.
And this is the little usb sound card I used: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01N905VOY/
And this is the box that the phone plugs into: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08RBZYSXP/. You'd have to use one of Carlinkit's more expensive boxes if you want CarPlay as well. Make sure you turn the "high output" option on in the software for this to keep the phone charged!
Edited by dxg on Saturday 1st October 11:39
Boot up is about 30 seconds. A little bit longer than it takes me to dig out my phone and plug it in.
Unfortunately, I do have to manually shut down the pi with the shutdown app. That's the problem with lineage. If I used crankshaft or openauto, the shutdown could be automated, but I'm all for keeping things simple - it's all running off the USB you can see sticking out the lighter socket...
I forget to shut it down half the time, though, and the install hasn't corrupted itself yet!
Unfortunately, I do have to manually shut down the pi with the shutdown app. That's the problem with lineage. If I used crankshaft or openauto, the shutdown could be automated, but I'm all for keeping things simple - it's all running off the USB you can see sticking out the lighter socket...
I forget to shut it down half the time, though, and the install hasn't corrupted itself yet!
And, it's worth noting that I could have just bought something like this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/CARPURIDE-Compatible-Touc...
but this was more fun!
but this was more fun!
I had a spare pi4 sitting on the shelf unused, so I took that, added homeassistant, frigate nvr and a coral usb accelerator then did a tiny bit of CCTV reconfiguration (to enable rtsp) and I now have ai-driven person detection and (when I set it up) notification, rather than the regular motion detection as standard with the CCTV which detects motion when a cloud goes over!
After two years my Pi 4 B 2GB has died, thought I'd get a replacement but don't seem to be able to find any boards for sale that don't include a starter kit.
I paid just over £30 for it back in 2020 so it's surprising that it's triple that today, guess it's all down to the component shortages and zero covid supply chain issues in China?
I was only using it for Octoprint but buying another would be half the price of the 3D printer, may try using something else.
I paid just over £30 for it back in 2020 so it's surprising that it's triple that today, guess it's all down to the component shortages and zero covid supply chain issues in China?
I was only using it for Octoprint but buying another would be half the price of the 3D printer, may try using something else.
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