I have been reading this forum and testing this amazing system for a while now. Most of my questions have been answered by looking at the documentation or searching here.
My testing has so far been proving that this system is perfect for what I am looking to do and moving forward is just now a matter of learning some higher level things within the system and building all the content needed. I have done all testing so far using a Raspberry Pi 4 using ethernet but next up I will be testing a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W using wifi as where I will be using it has not got any ethernet available but will have wifi…sort of…explain further in a minute.
I have just started testing using the Pi 4 using wifi here where I have very good wifi and immediately I booted the wifi enabled config it was working seemlessly.
The question I have is do you think this system will work using a mobile phone (Samsung) with a 'hotspot" connection? It’s no more than a username and password to connect so I see that as being no different to my network here? But is it likely to have problems over the 4G network do you think?
Thanks again to everyone in this community it’s a ripper!
Note that you currently need to use the testing version of the OS for the Pi Zero 2 W. The next update to stable will fix this and might be out before end of 2021.
Shouldn’t be a problem. Hotspots created by all mobile phones I’m aware use WPA2. The same standard most non-enterprisey WiFi access points use. So you need both the Hotspots name and a password.
You shouldn’t see any issues. If the connection is a bit unreliable due to bad reception, you might see the device as offline in the dashboard from time to time, but that’s no problem. The device will try to reconnect constantly. Downloads of assigned content can be resumed, so they will eventually succeed. Unless you assign new content, the data usage of the device should be fairly low (my estimate would be around 1-2MB/day).
Thanks very much Florian…That was what I was hoping to hear…even better your headsup to use the testing version for the Pi Zero 2W. I won’t have that device till the new year so I will keep an eye on new releases.
Hi all, just reporting back what I have found now that I am testing the Pi Zero 2W using wifi.
As you expected Florian, everything is positive and the device seems 100% stable.
The wifi connection has shown no sign of causing any problems at all.
CPU Memory usage reports: 256MB, 98% in use
GPU Memory usage reports: 256MB, 21% in use
Output frame rate: 60fps
System load: <15%
Content player memory usage: 64Mb
CPU Temperature runs at 55-60°C without a heatsink in a an original PI case.
I was a little concerned about the CPU Memory usage but no problem it seems?
Quite the opposite: You want the device to use all available memory as file system cache. The “Memory usage” section on the device page should properly visualize this. Additionally you can drill down the services part to see how much memory each of them uses.
Ah…Thats great then, cheers for the insight. I had never noticed the little ‘down-arrow’ to ‘Expand details’ until now…all usage fully detailed there for sure.
My confusion was that it seemed nearly all resources were close to being fully consumed, with little remaining. Thanks again for clearing that up.
With the exception of 4K (which is not needed in my case) then the Pi Zero 2W is a great option considering the price point.
Agreed. It’s my personal favourite: All the power of the Pi3 with its stable software environment (unlike the Pi4 which still feels work-in-progress) in a nice form factor at a good price. It’s great.
If only we could get any of them . I can get very small quantities (usually 1) if I shop around and am willing to buy at least a mid-priced kit at an inflated price.
@Florian, you mention that rPi4 seems like a work in progress, which agrees with my experience. I have three boards purchased in the fall of '19 and they all have developed strange problems with the video output. They will all drive two monitors during the boot process, but will drive zero or one once the OS (ant OS) is loaded. I have tried taking my IB sd card from my new rPi4 (which works, within limitations as to aggregate video feed, to a max of 2 at 1920x1080x50) pulling all the connectors off and placing them on the old boards, none of which will show any output past the initial boot text, even at low res.
Do you know if this is a common problem with the early 4s?
They are reasonably available here in Australia Jim, several places I looked had them but Core Electronics are the best price. But not sure if they ship to US and then the price would be through the roof I guess. Hmmm I just checked my link was working and they are out of stock atm.
. I can get very small quantities (usually 1) if I shop around and am willing to buy at least a mid-priced kit at an inflated price.