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  • Author Author: rohitrangwani
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Rocking Raspberry pi- Wolfson Audio Card

rohitrangwani

Hi guys

Got my Wolfson audio card this eve , I was exited to see it working.

 

 

There are many options available to us for our karaoke machine design but as the number of options increases ,the choice becomes hard.

There are few aspects of project that I would like consider now.

  1. If wolfson comes ,piface goes.
  2. If external sound card is used ,sound quality deteriorates.
  3. If wolfson is used ,we have to use the customised os available(based on rasbian),and many guys were working on RaspBMC i think.(again a problem)
  4. No choices for choosing other os available,if wolfson card is used.
  5. If you guys dont have any spare memory card (atleast 8GB) you have to go for formatting your Noobs pre-installed memory card.
  6. The SD Card needs to be of Class 6 or higher, especially if you want to read/write high quality audio.(source)
  7. If we use wolfson ,choice of using onboard digital setreo microphones for any purpose you want like voice control.
  8. Multiple sound capabilities if wolfson is used.

 

So, whats we are going to do next remains the question.

Comment your suggestions and queries.

 

 

--R.R.

  • If wolfson comes ,piface goes.

    Sadly, yes.

     

    However. If you look at the schematics and the user manual for the Wolfson Audio Card, there are apparently some pins which are unused and these can be re-soldered with sockets/wires. I'm not certain which PiFace you meant (there are two, one which has an LCD display and one without) or what you want to use it for?

     

    If external sound card is used ,sound quality deteriorates.

    You're going to have to go into more detail on this.

     

    If wolfson is used ,we have to use the customised os available(based on rasbian),and many guys were working on RaspBMC i think.(again a problem) No choices for choosing other os available,if wolfson card is used. If you guys dont have any spare memory card (atleast 8GB) you have to go for formatting your Noobs pre-installed memory card. The SD Card needs to be of Class 6 or higher, especially if you want to read/write high quality audio.


    This isn't accurate. Yes the operating system has to be linux based, unless you want to write your own drivers/modules for the Wolfson Audio Card.

     

    Let's say that you use Raspbian, the best way is to download the image as you say and write it to the card. The image is 4gByte in total and a Class 6 SD Card of this size isn't too much to get started with. Once you have that setup, then you can store files or read to/from a network or USB device. You don't have to store anything further, typically, on the SD Card.

     

    A member of element14 has made a collection of the changed files/kernel/modules here: Re: Re: Wolfson modified Noobs raspbian zipped img Cannot unzip new download and you should be able to use them on a Raspbian installation, but it won't necessarily work well on a RaspBMC installation and changes may/will be lost if the kernel's updated by Raspbian. Why on earth Wolfson didn't do this kind of package is beyond me.

     

    However, if you want to use RaspBMC with it that becomes a slightly different story. Unless you want to cross-compile (because compiling the drivers on the Raspberry Pi can take half a day) the Wolfson Audio Card drivers against the RaspBMC Linux kernel, then you will need to install Raspbian with the Wolfson Audio Card drivers and try installing XBMC on top of it. Instructions for doing so are at http://michael.gorven.za.net/raspberrypi/xbmc - your mileage may vary.

     

    Your alternative to the Wolfson Audio Card ? a USB soundcard.

  • I think it depends on the design requirements. If you want the images and text to appear on a large screen for the karaoke, then the PiFace CAD would not be needed as much. Then you could direct the audio out via HDMI maybe, and use the Wolfson audio card for mic input.

    However, some people may prefer to have a small display to choose the song maybe. In that case without additional hardware there is no choice but to connect a microphone through other means, e.g. USB soundcard and not use the Wolfson card.

    If you really wanted both together, then it may be possible to inspect the circuits for both the Wolfson card and the PiFace CAD (since I'm guessing after the registers have been set up in the Wolfson card, then the connections could be used for the PiFace CAD - or maybe there is a chip-select that doesn't clash with both boards - it would be just luck. There is also the option of running two RPI's : ) a bit excessive : )