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Audi/Video Playback and System Stability

A project log for Raspberry Pi 400 Daily Driver

Learning to use a Raspberry Pi 400 laptop as an everyday computer and sharing the results.

dustinDustin 12/03/2021 at 00:180 Comments

While I wait for the latest Jeff Geerling video to load on YouTube, I figured this would be a good time to post an update regarding the current state of the Pi.

I haven't had a single lockup since upgrading all the software, despite trying to get it to do so. It runs at a an average temperature of about 60C with an overclock of 2.2GHz, and the SSD sits around 44C. It would run a little cooler if I didn't have it sitting on my lap in bed, blocking all the bottom vents, but this is a realistic use case, and I like being comfortable. So far, so good. It seems updating has resolved the major issues. I still have working audio. Speaking of audio, I ran into a strange issue where the audio completely cut out every time the screen went to sleep. I was trying to sleep with headphones in, so I simply disabled the screen timeout at the time. I later woke up and realized that the audio is split from the HDMI signal by the LCD driver board in the Pidock. No HDMI signal, no audio. It's rather annoying, but I am grateful to have audio at all, considering the Pi 400 has no headphone jack. This leads me to another thought. I had considered making a HAT for the Pi 400 that includes audio output, a nice display and media controls so one could simply have a tiny tv handy while working on a Pi 400. This would make perfect sense for me, as I always have something playing. I hate bluetooth, so that's not a valid option. I'd like to let the display go to sleep and have music or tv continue to play and have access to it while the lid is closed. I might just get the PirateAudio bonnet thing from Pimoroni and be done with it.

I decided to find a dedicated music player instead of fiddling with VLC Media Player, and decided on Lollypop in the Pop_Shop. I try to stick with things from the Pop_Shop as i can be fairly certain they will actually work. Lollypop works just fine, though I am having trouble finding a few features, and don't like the lack of "currently playing" section. I enjoy it for the most part. I like to practice singing and having it pull up the lyrics is helpful for songs I can't understand or that are in foreign languages.

YouTube playback is better than ever using Firefox. Chromium wouldn't install last time I tried, and I am trying to get away from Google where I can, so Firefox it is. Updated Pop!_OS has given me the best out off box YouTube experience on the Pi so far. Everything else is pretty well unwatchable to me. I'm on very slow and spotty wifi, so I am sticking with 720p for now. I have been able to play 1080p as well.

Overall, the system is working well, and the new SSD has made a massive improvement. It went from "Usable" to "pleasant".

Ok, my video should be loaded by now, so I will end this entry here.

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