Pi Zero W 2 feasible for FPZ?

[BigCat]

Ah okay got ya, i knew i shouldve ordered another back then.

But hey with a redesign, maybe we'll get that usb-c.

(im just fingers crossed price range stays about the same lol)

[barleyguy]

Yeah, I was planning to figure out that "failed to find mixer element" message.  I feel like I figured that out years ago, but I don't recall what it was.  Anyway, I think the sound is working fine, but the message is annoying.  I'll try to get that fixed and release a new image.  I'd like to get some more feedback to see if anyone else has issues/suggestions before we do that.

Any point to maybe a 64-bit image for the zero 2? (Since its 64-bit capable)


(also, any idea when more freeplay zero boards will be in stock?)

Running in 64-bit tends to use a lot more RAM. Because the addresses and registers are 64-bit, anything actively running that copies them will take up more space. That's a way oversimplification, but the short version is that with only 512 megabytes of RAM on the Pi Zero 2, saving memory by running in 32-bit mode is probably still an advantage.

[Flavor]

Yeah, and in my quick testing, I couldn't get that 64-bit RetroPie (built by Monka) running on my Zero 2. It should be doable, but I just wanted to see if it would boot up, and it didn't have support for Zero 2.

[BigCat]

Alright got my Zero 2 in place, so far emulation works really well.

But i do have one odd problem; often now i notice when im scraping for Cover Art,
my system will slow down significantly (as if connection was lost and is trying to re-establish, or feeling as if cpu is throttled)
and will occasionally freeze completely.

When frozen i try to power the device down, yet it does not.
Instead i have to unplug the battery altogether.

As far as i can tell the only error messages im noticing are along the lines of "WLAN0 not deteced".
Could this likely be a soldering issue, or a faulty pi zero 2 issue?

[barleyguy]

I got mine built last night. It's working great, and fast.

I did have 3 sound issues, but all of them were fixed by selecting "Headphone" as the output device in Sound Settings of Emulation Station.

(They were the mixer error, software volume being locked at 100%, and movies locking up. But like I said, setting the output device to Headphone fixed all 3 issues.)

BigCat, you might try booting up raspbian on a different SD card with a monitor connected, and see if Wifi works consistently. That will help determine whether it's a hardware or software issue.

[barleyguy]

I noticed one other possible issue... At least on my image, the default video ram (GPU RAM 512) was set to 256 MB in config.txt. This only leaves 256 MB of RAM for running games. I changed it to 128 MB and everything seems to run fine. 64 MB might even work.

[Flavor]

Good catch, barleyguy. I wonder if that will help BigCat's issue, too.

[TexasPorcupine]

Good catch, barleyguy.  I wonder if that will help BigCat's issue, too.

Is it safe to update it online yet?  Or will you be issuing a new image soon? I have been using the test image and it works okay, just wanting to see if you made any improvements or tweaks yet. Thank you!

[Flavor]

I think it's safe to update that new SD image.

If you try to update the older one, it might be a large jump and is more prone to issues. I think it's worth a try, but I'd definitely make a SD backup first.

We would likely be releasing a new SD image in the near future, but we're working on some other new things at the moment.

[TexasPorcupine]

I think it's safe to update that new SD image. 

If you try to update the older one, it might be a large jump and is more prone to issues.  I think it's worth a try, but I'd definitely make a SD backup first.

We would likely be releasing a new SD image in the near future, but we're working on some other new things at the moment.

I'm running the newer image so it shouldn't be that big of a jump. Thanks!