Setting up 4 x Raspberry Pi as a media wall / PiWall

Quick notes on setting up 4 Raspberry Pi’s for a media wall using the PiWall info from piwall.co.uk and the built in tile codes.

Keep in mind that the raspberry pi’s need the network hard wired.  I initially tried doing this with WiFi and the displays are so pixelated they are not watchable.

On the raspberry pi’s:

Install Rasbian Lite

log in with pi / raspberry

$ sudo su –

# vi ~/.vimrc

set nocompabile

# systemctl enable ssh

#systemctl start ssh

# vi /etc/network/interfaces

under iface eth0 inet manual add this:

up route add -net 224.0.0.0 netmask 240.0.0.0 eth0

# service network restart

# wget http://dl.piwall.co.uk/pwlibs1_1.1_armhf.deb
# wget http://dl.piwall.co.uk/pwomxplayer_20130815_armhf.deb
# dpkg -i pwlibs1_1.1_armhf.deb
# dpkg -i pwomxplayer_20130815_armhf.deb

To immediately start testing:

# route add -net 224.0.0.0 netmask 240.0.0.0 eth0

and to listen:

# pwomxplayer –tile-code=41 udp://239.0.1.23:1234?buffer_size=1200000B

Where –tile-code=41 (upper left), 42 (upper right), 43 (lower left) or 44 (lower right).

On the player, which could be another Raspberry Pi, or in my case, a Linux Mint machine.

# apt-get install ffmpeg avconv libav-tools

# route add -net 224.0.0.0 netmask 240.0.0.0 eth0

# vi /etc/network/interfaces

under iface eth0 inet manual add this:

up route add -net 224.0.0.0 netmask 240.0.0.0 eth0

# avconv -re -i /path to/video.avi -vcodec copy -f avi -an udp://239.0.1.23:1234

You should see the video playing on all for displays

Now, I also wanted to be able to “cast” (since that seems to be the catch phrase right now) my desktop to the displays as well and here is how I did it.  Keep in mind, this turned out to be super laggy, but after using Chrome Cast, it was laggy as well.

# add-apt-repository ppa:maarten-baert/simplescreenrecorder
# apt-get update
# apt-get install simplescreenrecorder
# simplescreenrecorder

When it launches, click continue and create a new profile, give it a name, such as PiWall, click OK, and then Continue.

Set these:

Save as: udp://239.0.1.23:1234

Uncheck Separate file per segment (if it is checked)

Container: other

Container Name: avi

Codec: H.264

Constant rate factor: 38

Preset: ultrafast

Click Continue and then Start recording.  If all went well, you shouldn’t receive and error and after 1-2 seconds, you should see your desktop displayed on the PiWall.

In my experience, the quality looked pretty good but you do have a 1-2 second lag.  You can mess around with this by changing