2023 May 22 Stickied -FAQ- & -HELPDESK- thread - Boot problems? Power supply problems? Display problems? Networking prob

/RaspberryPi · Post by **/RaspberryPi** » Mon May 22, 2023 4:48 pm

Welcome to the r/raspberry_pi Helpdesk and Frequently Asked Questions!
Link to last week's thread

Having a hard time searching for answers to your Raspberry Pi questions? Let the r/raspberry_pi community members search for answers for you!† Looking for help getting started with a project? Have a question that you need answered? Was it not answered last week? Did not get a satisfying answer? A question that you've only done basic research for? Maybe something you think everyone but you knows? Ask your question here, operators are standing by!

This helpdesk and idea thread is here so that the front page won't be filled with these same questions day in and day out:

Q: What's a Raspberry Pi? What can I do with it? How powerful is it?
A: Check out this great overview
Q: Does anyone have any ideas for what I can do with my Pi?
A: Sure, look right here!‡
Q: My Pi is behaving strangely/crashing/freezing, giving low voltage warnings, ethernet/wifi stops working, USB devices don't behave correctly, what do I do?
A:. 99.999% of the time it's either a bad SD card or power problems. Use a USB power meter or measure the 5V on the GPIO pins with a multimeter while the Pi is busy (such as playing h265/x265 video) and/or get a new SD card. If the voltage is less than 5V your power supply and/or cabling is not adequate. When your Pi is doing lots of work it will draw more power. Even if your power supply claims to provide sufficient amperage, it may be mislabeled or the cable you're using to connect the power supply to the Pi may have too much resistance. You can use a USB load tester to test your power supply and cable. Some power supplies require negotiation to use the higher amperage, which the Pi does not do. If you're plugging in USB devices try using a powered USB hub with its own power supply and plug your devices into the hub and plug the hub into the Pi.
Q: Due to the chip shortage I'm having a hard time buying a Raspberry Pi, all the stores say sold out. Even after the most recent announcement from Raspberry Pi they are still hard to find. Where's the secret place to buy one without paying more than MSRP?
A: https://rpilocator.com/
Q: I just did a fresh install with the latest Raspberry Pi OS and the default user/password of pi/raspberry doesn't work for ssh or logging in, why not?
A: The default pi user no longer exists, you need to create your own account
Q: The screen is just black or blank or saying no signal, what do I do?
A: Follow these steps
Q: The only way to troubleshoot my problem is using a multimeter but I don't have one. What can I do?
A: Get a basic multimeter, they are not expensive.
Q: My Pi won't boot, how do I fix it?
A: Step by step guide for boot problems
Q: I want to watch Netflix/Hulu/Amazon/Vudu/Disney+ on a Pi but the tutorial I followed didn't work, does someone have a working tutorial?
A: Use a Fire Stick/AppleTV/Roku. Pi tutorials used tricks that no longer work or are fake click bait.
Q: What model of Raspberry Pi do I need so I can watch YouTube in a browser?
A: No model of Raspberry Pi is capable of watching YouTube smoothly through a web browser, you need to use VLC.
Q: I want to know how to do a thing, not have a blog/tutorial/video/teacher/book explain how to do a thing. Can someone explain to me how to do that thing?
A: Uh... What?
Q: Is it possible to use a single Raspberry Pi to do multiple things? Can a Raspberry Pi run Pi-hole and something else at the same time?
A: YES. Pi-hole uses almost no resources. You can run Pi-hole at the same time on a Pi running Minecraft which is one of the biggest resource hogs. The Pi is capable of multitasking and can run more than one program and service at the same time. (Also known as "workload consolidation" by Intel people.) You're not going to damage your Pi by running too many things at once, so try running all your programs before worrying about needing more processing power or multiple Pis.
Q: Why is transferring things over the LAN/internet so slow?
A: If you have a Pi 4 with SSD, please check this post on the Pi forums. Otherwise it's a networking problem and/or disk & filesystem problem, please go to r/HomeNetworking or r/LinuxQuestions.
Q: I only have one outlet and I need to plug in several devices, what do I do?
A: They make things called power strips aka multi-tap extensions.
Q: The red and green LEDs are on/off/blinking but it doesn't work, can someone help me?
A: Start here
Q: I'm trying to run x86 software on my Raspberry Pi but it doesn't work, how do I fix it?
A: Get an x86 computer. A Raspberry Pi is ARM based, not x86.
Q: Should I add a heatsink, fan, or some kind of cooling to my Raspberry Pi?
A: If you think you need one then you should add it
Q: Can I use this screen that came from ____ ?
A: No
Q: I run my Pi headless and there's a problem with my Pi and the best way to diagnose it or fix it is to plug in a monitor & keyboard, what do I do?
A: Plug in a monitor & keyboard.
Q: My Pi seems to be causing interference preventing the WiFi from working
A. Using USB 3 cables that are not properly shielded can cause interference and the Pi 4 can also cause interference when HDMI is used at high resolutions.
Q: I'm trying to use the built-in composite video output that is available on the Pi 2/3/4 headphone jack, do I need a special cable?
A. Make sure your cable is wired correctly and you are using the correct RCA plug. Composite video cables for mp3 players will not work, the common ground goes to the wrong pin. Camcorder cables will often work, but red and yellow will be swapped on the Raspberry Pi.
Q: I'm running my Pi with no monitor connected, how can I use VNC?
A: First, do you really need a remote GUI? Try using ssh instead. If you're sure you want to access the GUI remotely then ssh in, type vncserver -depth 24 -geometry 1920x1080 and see what port it prints such as :1, :2, etc. Now connect your client to that.
Q: I want to do something that has been well documented and there are numerous tutorials showing how to do it on Linux. How can I do it on a Raspberry Pi?
A: A Raspberry Pi is a full computer running Linux and doesn't use special stripped down embedded microcontroller versions of standard Linux software. Follow one of the tutorials for doing it on Linux. Also see question #1.
Q: I want to do something that has been well documented and there are numerous tutorials showing how to do it with an Arduino. How can I do it on a Raspberry Pi Pico?
A: Follow one of the tutorials for doing it on Arduino, a Pico can be used with the Arduino IDE.
Q: I'm trying to do something with Bluetooth and it's not working, how do I fix it?
A: It's well established that Bluetooth and Linux don't get along, this problem is not unique to the Raspberry Pi.

Before posting your question think about if it's really about the Raspberry Pi or not. If you were using a Raspberry Pi to display recipes, do you really think r/raspberry_pi is the place to ask for cooking help? There may be better places to ask your question, such as:

Asking in a forum more specific to your question will likely get better answers!

† See the /r/raspberry_pi rules.‡ While /r/raspberry_pi should not be considered your personal search engine, some exceptions will be made in this help thread.
‡ If the link doesn't work it's because you're using a broken buggy mobile client. Please contact the developer of your mobile client and let them know they should fix their bug. In the meantime use a web browser in desktop mode instead.
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Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/raspberry_pi/c ... read_boot/