Author: Matt

Disabling the ability to login to your Pi via SSH using a password can be a useful security enhancement. If someone is attempting to guess or brute force there way into your Pi via SSH disabling the password route will massively increase their chances of failure. Obviously you should only disable the ability to login using a password when you have successfully configured SSH keys. For that reason I would complete the steps below using an SSH connection that uses SSH keys. That ensures you have a method to connect to your Pi once the password route has been closed.…

Elecrow have recently launched their Meteor 10.1 inch IPS touchscreen monitor with HDMI input. It makes a perfect Raspberry Pi screen. It’s standout feature is a ring of RGB LEDs mounted in the outer edge of the case. These LEDs are capable of producing 19 different light patterns to add a sense of atmosphere to any project. Elecrow sent me one free of charge with the only requirement for me to share my thoughts on it, whatever they may be. I’ll give you all my thoughts on it, the good and the bad. But the short version is I like…

Displaying the pinout of a Raspberry Pi Pico is possible using my “picopins” script. The script displays the pinout in a colour coded format showing the location of power, ground and GPIO pins. I find it useful if I’m coding Pico projects on my laptop or Pi 400 and need to check the location of a GPIO pin. The bash script runs from the Linux command line and I’ve tested it on Raspberry Pi OS and Ubuntu. This can be a useful addition to other pinout resources such as the official Pi Pico diagram. Download picopins Bash Script The script…

Resetting the Pi Pico usually requires unplugging the USB cable either from the Pi Pico or your computer. It’s a lot easier to add a reset button to your circuit which you can press instead of unplugging cables. It’s easy to do and I tend to add a reset button before starting any Pi Pico or Pi Pico W project. While developing with the Pi Pico it is often required to reset the board. This is usually due to a number of reasons: Adding a Reset Button to the Pi Pico & Pi Pico W The reset button just needs…

The Pi Pico boards have an onboard LED which you can turn on and off using MicroPython. It is useful for indicating activity as your code runs. The LED is wired up slightly differently on the Pi Pico and Pi Pico W but the technique below will work for both boards assuming you are using the latest firmware. Pi Pico & Pi Pico W Onboard LED Here is the MicroPython code you can use to turn on the LED: The following additional commands can be used to manipulate the LED:

The Pi Pico W Pinout is identical to that of the original Pi Pico. The Pi Pico W microcontroller board offers all the features of the Pi Pico with the addition of WiFi and Bluetooth. The Pico W can accept 0.1″ pin-headers which can be soldered to the board as required. Pi Pico W Pinout Many of the pins on the Pi Pico W board can provide different features and capabilities. Pi Pico W Physical Pin Numbering The diagram below shows the pins on the Pi Pico W and how they are numbered: Power Pins The following pins are related…

CrowPi L is a Raspberry Pi 4 based laptop created by Elecrow. It is a slightly different variation of the CrowPi 2 which was released in the summer or 2020. The idea is that the device is as portable as a laptop but with the ability to interface with the Pi’s various connectors and GPIO header. Elecrow sent me a CrowPi L and Crowtail Starter Kit to review. They placed no restrictions on me and this article is my honest unbiased opinion. The packaging is all very professional and no different to items you might buy in a retail shop.…

Today Raspberry Pi have announced the Pi Pico W, Pico H and Pi Pico WH. These compliment the original Pi Pico. You can buy a Pi Pico W and Pi Pico H immediately with the Pi Pico WH being made available in August. The Pi Pico W adds WiFi and Bluetooth Low-energy. The H variant adds a 3-pin debug connector and pre-soldered headers. The Pi Pico WH adds WiFi, Bluetooth LE, 3-pin debug socket as well as the pre-soldered headers. Pi Pico W Specification: RP2040 microcontroller chip designed by Raspberry Pi in the United KingdomDual-core Arm Cortex M0+ processor, flexible clock…

If you run Kodi on a RetroPie system you can add Kodi to the RetroPie menu as if it is a game system. This guide assumes you already have Kodi installed on your RetroPie system where it appears as an item under the “Ports” system. To continue you will need to use the command line. You can get to the command line either Pressing F4 if you have a keyboard attached directly to your systemUsing SSH to connect to the RetroPie system from another computer Step 1 – Copy es_systems.cfg file Firstly we need to copy the default es_systems.cfg file:…

This guide explains how to disable auto-login on Raspberry Pi OS. By default when you install the Raspberry Pi OS with the desktop it will auto-login when you power-up the Pi. This is really convenient for lots of projects as it gets you straight to the desktop. If you are using your Pi as a desktop computer this starts to become more of a security/privacy risk. If someone breaks into my house and steals my Pi 400 they could power it up elsewhere and potentially run my browser full of saved passwords and bookmarks. Or gain access to any files…

Setting up Pi cloud storage with MEGA is really useful as it means your project files can be safely backed up automatically. You also have the benefit of accessing those files from other devices via a web browser. This can speed up swapping data between devices and reduce the messing about with USB drives and network shares. MEGA is a popular cloud storage provider and they properly support Linux, Windows and MacOS, unlike some of their competitors. Their Desktop app “MEGAsync” works great on the Pi and is really easy to setup. Step 1: Sign-up to MEGA To use the…

If you are interested in monitoring the RetroPie temperature you can add a custom option to your RetroPie menu. This will display the RetroPie temperature on the screen for a predefined number of seconds. You will need to have a keyboard attached to your RetroPie system or have SSH access. Step 1: Create RetroPie Temperature Script You’ll need to get to the command line. If you are using a keyboard connected to the Pi then within RetroPie press F4 to enter the command line. If using SSH connect using your preferred client. At the command prompt navigate to the RetroPie…

Understanding the Pi Pico Pinout is vital to getting the best out of Pi Pico. The Raspberry Pi Pico is a microcontroller board that makes use of the RP2040 chip developed by the designers of the Raspberry Pi. The Pico can accept 0.1″ pin-headers which can be soldered to the board as required. Pi Pico Pinout Many of the pins on the Pi Pico board can provide different features and capabilities. Pi Pico Physical Pin Numbering The diagram below shows the pins on the Pi Pico and how they are numbered: Power Pins The following pins are related to power:…

The Arduino IDE is a vital tool for flashing Arduino devices. You can install Arduino IDE on Raspberry Pi OS using these easy steps. You could use apt: but this results in the installation of Arduino IDE version 1.6. This is an extremely outdated version which makes it difficult to use or impossible to flash certain devices. So I recommend manually installing the Arduino IDE using the software available from the official Arduino site. I’m assuming you have a working installation of a recent Raspberry Pi OS image. Download Arduino IDE Software Firstly visit the Official Arduino website:https://www.arduino.cc/en/software Then click…

Booting a Pi 400 from an SSD is an easy upgrade from the standard SD card. It can give your Pi additional storage capacity, improved reliability as well as massively increased read/write performance. With the price of SSDs dropping to pocket-money prices you can perform this upgrade for less than $40 (£30). I have been running my Pi 400 from a SanDisk Ultra 128GB Class 10 A1 microSD card. That had been working fine but I decided to give an SSD a try to see how easy it would be. The short answer is that is really easy and only…

As the Raspberry Pi has become more powerful temperature management has become more important. This article aims to provide some easy techniques to monitor the temperature of your Pi. The Pi 4 will start to throttle the performance if the temperature exceeds 80 degrees so it is wise to keep an eye on your system temperature.

Overclocking the Raspberry Pi 400 is easy and gives you an extra performance boost for free. The Pi 400 has been designed to be used without any active cooling. This has been achieved with careful PCB design and a massive heat-sink. Not only does this allow the Pi 400 to run at 1.8GHz out the box but it also allows for some easy overclocking. In a Pi Foundation blog post Simon Martin stated, We’ve solved the cooling challenge so users don’t have to give this any thought. Raspberry Pi 400 contains a heat spreader that dissipates the heat across the…

The Raspberry Pi 400 is the latest product to be released by the Raspberry Pi Foundation. The 400 is a compact keyboard with a custom Pi 4 PCB inside. This gives you a compact quad-core computer with all the connectors on the rear edge. Plug in a monitor, mouse and power cable and you have a desktop computer with GPIO pins. The device I got to play with was supplied in a plain white carton, with a mouse, USB-C power supply, microSD card, HDMI cable and a copy of “The Official Raspberry Pi Beginner’s Guide” book. I expect the retail…

CrowPi2 is a new product that has been launched by Elecrow on KickStarter. It is a laptop-style shell that includes a huge selection of pre-connected sensors, switches and displays. As with the original CrowPi the idea behind it is that you can easily create and test projects without needing to worry about lots of wiring. CrowPi2 Hardware The hardware provides a number of features : Laptop-style enclosure11.6 inch IPS Full-HD screenWireless keyboard & mouse2 megapixel camera and microphone22 built-in sensors and modulesStereo Speakers3.5mm headphone jackChoice of 5v or 12v power inputInternal tray for storageSmall breadboard It’s chunkier than a normal…

Setting up a Raspberry Pi VPN connection is easy. Once subscribed to a VPN service you can access the internet using it and protect your privacy. A VPN (Virtual Private Network) creates an encrypted tunnel between your computer and a remote server. All your internet traffic is routed through the tunnel and appears to the other end to be using the IP address of the VPN server. This hides your normal IP address which in turn hides your identity and location. You can find free VPN services out there but a legitimate service only costs £35 a year and is…

The Pi Zero has no Ethernet port. If your project requires Ethernet you can add it using either an Ethernet module or a USB to Ethernet adapter. At this point someone is going to question why you would want to add Ethernet to a Pi Zero. Why not just use a standard Pi which already includes the port? I guess the answer is that there are some projects where using a Pi Zero is desirable due to power consumption or size considerations but you also need the functionality of Ethernet devices. I’ve got a project in mind which I will…

Ntablet is a new Kickstarter project from a team of engineers based in Canada. It aims to provide a Linux based device that can be used by product developers or hobbyists to create bespoke systems. There is no Raspberry Pi involved but could form part of a system that does include one. It also overlaps with various Pi related technologies so may be of interest to Pi owners. The project team sent me one to take a look at. Here are my honest thoughts. Specifications The device has the following specifications : Although it has an SD card slot the…