Raspberry Pi

A Raspberry Pi behind the TV makes a sturdy, low-power player that can run for months untouched. SignBlink's setup script does all the kiosk work for you.

#What you need

• A Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 with 2 GB of memory or more.
• Its official power supply. Weak chargers cause random restarts.
• A microSD card, 16 GB or larger.
• A micro-HDMI to HDMI cable (the Pi 4 and 5 use micro-HDMI).
• A keyboard and mouse, for setup only.
• Internet: a network cable is the most reliable; Wi-Fi works too.

#1. Put Raspberry Pi OS on the memory card

1. On your computer, download Raspberry Pi Imager from raspberrypi.com/software and open it.
2. Choose your Pi model, then Raspberry Pi OS (64-bit). It must be the version with desktop, not "Lite".
3. Choose your memory card, then Next. When it offers to customize settings, choose Edit settings and set a username and password, your Wi-Fi name and password, and your time zone.
4. Optional but handy: on the Services tab, turn on SSH so you can manage the Pi from another computer later.

#2. Connect the Pi to the TV

Put the card in the Pi. Plug the HDMI cable into the port closest to the power socket (HDMI 0), then into the TV. Plug in the keyboard, mouse and power, and wait for the desktop.

#3. Run the SignBlink setup

Open Terminal (the black >_ icon at the top left of the screen), then type or paste this and press Enter:

curl -fsSL https://signblink.com/pi -o signblink-pi.sh && bash signblink-pi.sh

It takes 1 to 3 minutes. It installs the Chromium browser if needed, turns off screen blanking, turns on automatic sign-in, and sets SignBlink to open full screen at every start. When it's done it says Done.

#4. Restart and connect

1. Restart the Pi with sudo reboot.
2. SignBlink opens full screen and shows a 6-character code. Enter it under Screens → Add screen.
3. Unplug the keyboard and mouse. From now on the Pi looks after itself.

#Tips

• Turning the TV sideways? Set the orientation in SignBlink's screen settings, not in the Pi's display settings.
• Mount the Pi where air can reach it. A Pi 5 runs cooler with the official Active Cooler.
• You can restart the player from SignBlink (the screen's ⋯ menu), so you rarely need to touch the Pi.
• To use the Pi as a normal computer again, run bash signblink-pi.sh --uninstall (over SSH, for example) and restart.

#If something isn't right

The script says it needs Raspberry Pi OS "with desktop". The card has the Lite version. Write the card again with Raspberry Pi OS (64-bit), the one with desktop.

"Could not resolve host", or nothing downloads. The Pi isn't online. Check the network cable, or click the network icon at the top right of the desktop and join your Wi-Fi.

After restarting I see the desktop instead of SignBlink. Give it 30 seconds. If it still doesn't open, run the setup command again and check that it ends with Done.

No sound from the TV. Right-click the speaker icon on the Pi's desktop and choose the HDMI output, then check the screen's Sound tab in SignBlink.

It shows a new code after a restart. Open the screen in SignBlink, go to the Player tab and enter the new code under Replace the player. Your playlists stay as they are.