PI Top / PI Ceed Speaker Driver

Hi

After much head aching I have managed to enable the PI speaker using RISCOS.

The speaker uses a I2C switch (TCA9543A) so this needs to be switched to allow access to
the TAS2505 which drives the speaker, anyway it might be of use to others so download from
below, its in BASIC so anyone can tweak it, if needed.

Update:
I forgot to say that I had to edit my config.txt and add the line below before the sound would work.
hdmi_force_edid_audio=1

http://www.mbelect.co.uk/RISCOS/progs/pi_spk.zip

Terry

What the ‘PiTop’ like – which pi board are you using?
Whats the max res – of the screen you can use?
Can it be driven above it’s stated value?
Is there any kind of WiFi?

You can use any version of pi with a Pi-top (We’ve not tried it but I see know reason why a Pi Zero shouldn’t work)
The screen is 1366×768 I doubt it can be overdriven.
The pi-top comes with a WiFi dongle (no RISC OS support)
We have a nano WiFi router that will fit inside and give RISC OS WiFi in the normal RISC OS way.

Our tailoring of RISC OS for the pi-top is progressing well:-)

Terry, big thanks for your program and I can confirm that my pi-top speaker is working in RISCOS as well as Raspbian. Very neat that your code allows for the various speaker options (Left, Right and mono).
Colin you can use the pi-top with a screen resolution of 1920×1080 but unless you have very good eye sight, 1360×768 is best.

Hi Norman

No problem good to hear it works.

As you have seen depending on where the L/R/M switch is it changes
the address of the I2C chip.

Regards

Terry

If you are the author of !RiscPCB – you might be interested in a util ‘gerb2tif’ on Theo Markettos site.

Hi Colin

Yes I am the author of !RiscPCB I never spotted gerb2tiff thanks for the info
I will go and have a look.

With regards to the screen is seems to be pretty good quality and as norman
said you can use the 1920×1080 but I default it to 1360×768.

I was thinking of 1280 × 800 C16M -like I’am using on a Portable – with a emulator.

By the way – is it possible for a util to do a conversion between Gerber >> !RiscPCB (is RiscPCB file format described/documented?)

I did ask Mrs Miskin a while back – if she could do a Gerber >> Draw – she has done various Draw file programs – but nothing came of it.

That reminds me the RISC OS PCB program we used to use nearly 30? years ago (I forget its name) was written in BASIC (OAK PCB?) and the output was for a plotter, I added an output a to Draw format. IIRC it was quite easy to do. Given my limited programming abilities it had to be!

The Latest version of RiscPCB uses a text format for its main PCB files
and its library components.

if you load a file into a text editor its quite easy to see, how the file
is constructed.

On my list of things to do is a gerber import function but annoying things
like working keep getting in the way and after programming almost every day it
takes a lot of effort to also choose to program in your spare time :-)

I must of missed the update to 1.02 – Sept 2015 of RiscPCB :-(
Thanks for your work.

I wonder if anyone has a non working version of the RPC power supply PCB – to copy.

I suppose this has come up before – but what about being able to load a sprite of a circuit board – in !RiscPCB – in the background – so that you can copy – over it.

The pi-top comes with a WiFi dongle (no RISC OS support)

I believe it only comes with a dongle if you purchase it as an optional addon.

We have a nano WiFi router that will fit inside and give RISC OS WiFi in the normal RISC OS way.

I shoved my TP-Link in, which annoying doesn’t leave enough space for the Pi-Top speaker…not that I wanted to buy one when I noticed the $40 price at checkout. I’m going to try speakers from an old laptop instead.

Our tailoring of RISC OS for the pi-top is progressing well:-)

How’s this coming along? I could do with a battery indicator, brightness adjustment and power saving (I’m sure there’s already a Module for this, but I couldn’t find it despite searching for a good hour).

I’ve not noticed any issues with F12 that some people have reported, although having to hold fn for all the function keys is a pain. I’m half tempted to wedge it down, although the keyboard is apparently reprogrammable – which I’ve not looked into yet.

I’m not impressed with the quality, the plastic is so thin in places it’s cracking, the screen is at the lower end of the quality spectrum and the keyboard is awful. Thankfully I’m only using it to test, I couldn’t use it for typing as you really have to push the keys hard and central before they register.

One RISCOS issue I have noticed (on Pi3 with the 14-08-16 build) is that hot plugging an external mouse causes the OS to stall every half second or so. I’ve yet to try it without the internal mouse/keyboard plugged in to confirm if it’s a Pi-top specific issue.

is that hot plugging an external mouse causes the OS to stall every half second or so

I did have the same issue with a Lapdock. External mouse stop or crash the OS if the internal one is still in use.

Our tailoring of RISC OS for the pi-top is progressing well:-)

How’s this coming along? I could do with a battery indicator, brightness adjustment and power saving (I’m sure there’s already a Module for this, but I couldn’t find it despite searching for a good hour).

Our software does battery indicator, brightness adjustment, power off etc but no^H^H limited power saving that needs done at a lower level than we have experience for and reports of 8-10 hours RISC OS use without it, means it is not a high priority

I’ve not noticed any issues with F12 that some people have reported, although having to hold fn for all the function keys is a pain. I’m half tempted to wedge it down, although the keyboard is apparently reprogrammable – which I’ve not looked into yet.

On all the pi-tops we’ve seen (delivered December or later) the Fn keys do not work and F1-F12 can only be accessed using the ‘pi-top’ modifier key in conjunction with !HID. We are looking into a better solution.
pi-top have told me that there has not been any changes to the keyboard micro-controller firmware, empiric evidence suggests otherwise.

As we now have fully useable system we are working on finalising the options, prices and an announcement.

On all the pi-tops we’ve seen (delivered December or later) the Fn keys do not work and F1-F12 can only be accessed using the ‘pi-top’ modifier key in conjunction with !HID.

They’re all working for me, with firmware / RISCOS from yesterday. If it’s not a change in the PiTop firmware, has a change in RISCOS fixed the issue?

I’ve been experimenting with a PiTop keyboard connected to a BBxM. I’ve set a sysvar to cause RO to ignore the device, and instead opened endpoints 1 to 3 and simply hex dumped the incoming messages into icons.

In my experiments the Fn key modifies the function keys until any one of the sound function keys (mute, volume up, volume down) is pressed, after which the Fn key is ignored and the unmodified key codes always come through. This state of affairs persists until the keyboard is unplugged and replugged.

It shouldn’t be necessary AFAIK to do anything different or extra in order to handle a keyboard – does anyone know different?

I’m puzzled as to what (other than a firmware bug in the keyboard itself) could possibly cause the Fn key to be ignored.

In my experiments the Fn key modifies the function keys until any one of the sound function keys (mute, volume up, volume down) is pressed, after which the Fn key is ignored and the unmodified key codes always come through. This state of affairs persists until the keyboard is unplugged and replugged.

And yet with the Pi-Top keyboard here, plugged into a Raspberry Pi, using your software always shows the FN key having an effect, even after pressing the audio keys multiple times!
RISC OS, however, doesn’t recognise FN+P1 as being F1. Even more puzzling!

And yet with the Pi-Top keyboard here, plugged into a Raspberry Pi, using your software always shows the FN key having an effect, even after pressing the audio keys multiple times!
RISC OS, however, doesn’t recognise FN+P1 as being F1. Even more puzzling!

To add to the confusion FN+P1 works as expected on mine, but pressing a sound function key kills the keyboard completely.

I agree, the touch pad is especially bad. For any serious typing, I use a wireless keyboard and mouse.

I have a pi-top speaker and my TP-Link WR702N fits neatly in the remaining space, with the wiring in a North-South configuration.

PS Just started to learn to use Textile

To add to the confusion FN+P1 works as expected on mine, but pressing a sound function key kills the keyboard completely.

This is because, when you press a sound key, the keyboard attempts to send data over endpoint 3, which RO isn’t listening to – and the keyboard hangs there until something at the host end receives it, i.e. indefinitely.

If I’d written firmware like that, I’d hang my head in shame and consider it as a bug that it was my duty to fix.

Please download and try running my little PiKbd3 app You’ll need to run it before touching any of the sound keys.

Note: the app and even the folder it’s in will probably disappear soon when they are no longer necessary.

If I’d written firmware like that, I’d hang my head in shame and consider it as a bug that it was my duty to fix.

Maybe I’m old and jaded and cynical, but the more I look at my webcam, the more my jaw hits the ground.

In case you haven’t seen it – http://www.heyrick.co.uk/blog/index.php?diary=20160810 – it’s a cute little thing, with firmware written by a tranquillised five year old.

I kind of wish I was smart enough to rip out the MIPS board and the naff firmware and then run the thing off a Pi Zero…
At least http://xx.xx.xx.xx:8080//proc/kcore doesn’t work on this device, because that would be a really poor show.

So, yeah. I think we ought to just assume these days that any mass-market electronic device is going to be produced to the shortest timescale and the lowest budget possible, but will have flaws and security holes you could drive a truck through. When lots more people adopt the “Internet of Things” (and not just talkative white goods, I’d lump smart meters in here too), the world might wake up and realise exactly how much their equipment is blathering and how easy it is to compromise (most cheap IP cams (mine included) have absolutely NO log of activity and a firmware update mechanism that is WIDE open). By then? Might be a bit too late to disconnect everything.
Until then? Theresa May¹ must be wetting herself with excitement. So much mostly worthless information to collect, archive, and trawl through.

¹ Come now, surely this shameless power grab surprises nobody, right? I mean, what did you expect? Stronger Human Rights?
Cue the opening montage of The Prisoner…

As we now have fully useable system we are working on finalising the options, prices and an announcement.

Chris Evans

The Pi-top running RISC OS will be introduced and demonstrated by Chris Evans at the next meeting of the Surrey and Sussex AUG on Monday, 12th September in the Methodist Church Hall, London Road, Horsham, W. Sussex RH12 1AN.

Attendance is free and all are welcome. The meeting starts at 8pm and is a 10-minute walk from Horsham railway station with directions by public transport or car on the website at http://www.sasaug.org.uk .

Has anyone had any luck getting sound working under RISC OS using a Pi-Top Speaker (v2) on the Pi-Top 2?

I was wondering the same thing – any luck getting sound working under RISC OS using Pi-Top Speaker (V2).

The above BASIC code for v1 isn’t working for v2.