Falcon Player v1.x - Install Instructions - Raspberry Pi(Zero/A/A+/B/B+/Bv2/Bv3)

[MyKroFt]

NOTE: FPP v1.x is no longer developed or supported.  Users should move to v2.x.  See https://falconchristmas.com/forum/index.php/topic,9372.0.html


NOTE: These instructions are for installing FPP v1.x on the Raspberry Pi.

NOTE: This information is up to date as of March 16, 2017.

NOTE: This set of Install Instructions is for the Raspberry Pi models Zero/A/A+/B/B+/Bv2/Bv3
NOTE: These instructions have been updated to point to the new FPP v1.8 Pi image which also works on the Pi B v3 and Pi Zero.  The new v1.8 image also works on 4GB SD cards where the previous v1.5 SD image required a 8GB card.  For best performance - a Class 10 SD card is recommended.

Installing the Falcon Player (FPP) on your Raspberry Pi

The latest FPP release for the Raspberry Pi is FPP v1.8 and is available for download at the following location:

FPP v1.8 Release Pi SD image: https://github.com/FalconChristmas/fpp/releases/download/1.8/FPP-v1.8-Pi.zip

The Falcon Player is designed to be treated like a software appliance.  To make FPP installation easier on the Raspberry Pi, the player is distributed in a ZIP file which contains the Pi NOOBs installer.  This installer will install the Raspbian Linux Operating System and the FPP software onto the SD card.  You will need to copy the contents of the FPP .zip file onto a SD card and boot the Pi using the SD card.  Upon boot, the NOOBs installer will take over and install Raspbian and the Falcon Player.

These instructions will guide you through installing the NOOBs image on your SD card that will allow you to easily install the OS and FPP as well as recover your card if the OS becomes corrupted.

   
• Insert an SD card that is 4GB to 32GB in size into your computer.
• Format the SD card so that the Pi can read it
  
        
  • Windows
    
             
    • Download the SD Association's Formatting Tool¹ from https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/eula_windows/
    • Install and run the Formatting Tool on your machine.  We recommend using the SD Card Association utility because the built-in Windows format utility will only format the first partition that Windows recognizes which will not properly re-format some USB drives or drives that have previously been used with the NOOBs installer.
    • Check that the SD card you inserted matches the one selected by the Tool
    • Click the "Quick format" radio button.
    • Click the "Format" button
  • Mac
    
             
    • Download the SD Association's Formatting Tool from https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/eula_mac/
    • Install and run the Formatting Tool on your machine.  We recommend using the SD Card Association utility because the built-in format utility may only format the first partition that the OS recognizes which will not properly re-format some USB drives or drives that have previously been used with the NOOBs installer.
    • Select "Overwrite Format"
    • Check that the SD card you inserted matches the one selected by the Tool
    • Click the "Format" button
  • Linux
    
             
    • We recommend using gparted (or the command line version parted)
    • Format the entire disk as a single vFAT partition
    • A command-line script called formatSD.sh is available in the git repository for those who prefer the command-line.
• Download the latest release of the Falcon Player image for the Pi from the link at the top of this post.
• Extract the contents of the downloaded FPP .zip file onto the formatted SD card.  The 'OS' and 'default' subdirectories should be visible in the top level directory on the SD card.
• Insert a USB flash drive into the Pi.  This drive MUST be formatted FAT32.  This will be used for sequences, media, FPP configuration, and logs once FPP is running.
• Insert the SD card into your Pi and connect the power supply to boot the Pi and install FPP. Your Pi will now boot into NOOBS and will automatically start installing the FPP image onto your SD card.
• Once the install is complete, the Pi will automatically reboot into Linux, and start FPP.  All further interaction with FPP will be via the web UI accessible via http://fpp/
• NOTE:  To allow FPP to fully boot and update itself, the RasPi should be connected via CAT5 do a router that can provide full internet access. It will use DHCP to obtain a working address from your network and connect to the server to download the latest updates.

If you have a monitor connected and the display is not visible during the NOOBs install, you may need to select the correct output mode for your display by pressing one of the following number keys on your keyboard;
1. HDMI mode this is the default display mode.
2. HDMI safe mode select this mode if you are using the HDMI connector and cannot see anything on screen when the Pi has booted.
3. Composite PAL mode select either this mode or composite NTSC mode if you are using the composite RCA video connector
4. Composite NTSC mode