Lite player advanced network & resets

Advanced network connection guide

NOT RELEVANT FOR MOST CUSTOMERS

Obtaining the MAC address for your Raspberry Pi player

1. Connect a keyboard to any USB port on the device and power it on.
2. Once it finishes booting up, press CTRL+W to exit out of the app.
3. Press CTRL+ALT+T to open terminal
4. Type in the following command: “ip link show” and then press enter
5. The MAC address for an ethernet (wired) connection is found in section 2 for “eth0:” the MAC address is listed after link/ether in that section and will be a string of 12-17 characters, broken out in pairs of two separated by colons. An example is e4:5f:01:2c:86:b1
6. The MAC address for a WiFi connection (wireless) is found in section 3 for “wlan0:” the MAC address is listed after link/ether in that section and will be a string of 12-17 characters, broken out in pairs of two separated by colons. An example is e4:5f:01:2c:86:b1

Connecting to a hidden SSID ( hidden WiFi network)

What is an SSID? SSID (Service Set Identifier) is simply the name of your WiFi network, which is typically visible in a list of nearby networks. Sometimes a company will choose to hide the SSID so that it isn’t broadcast for people to connect to. In this case you must know what the SSID (and password) are in order to connect to it invisibly. For Raspberry Pi players, follow the steps below:

1. Connect your Pi to power and let it boot up fully.
2. Press CTRL+W to exit out of the SmartSign2go window.
3. Click on the terminal icon at the top-left to enter the command line
4. Type “sudo raspi-config” to open the configuration menu
5. Choose Option 1 for “System Options”
6. Choose option S1 for “Wireless LAN”
7. Type in the SSID, EXACTLY as it is spelled (it is case sensitive!) and hit enter.
8. Type in the password (if applicable) [also exactly as it should be spelled] and hit enter.
9. Unplug your Pi from power for a few seconds to reboot it and it should be able to connect to the hidden WiFi.
   • Remember that it usually will say that it can’t connect when it first boots up, but then upon the second try after 15 seconds or so it will.

How to remove unwanted WiFi networks from memory

1. Connect your Pi to power and let it boot up fully.
2. Press CTRL+W to exit out of the SmartSign2go window.
3. Press CTRL+ALT+T to open a terminal window
4. Type “sudo su” and press enter
5. Type “sudo nano /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf” and press enter
6. Highlight and delete the relevant wifi network block (including the ‘network=’ and opening/closing braces. Here is an example of what to delete:

7. Press CTRL+X followed by ‘Y’ and enter to save the file.

8. Type “sudo reboot” to reboot your Pi.

Configuring a static IP address for your Raspberry Pi player

1. DHCP Configuration

Raspberry Pi OS (formerly known as Raspbian) uses DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) to assign an IP address to the Raspberry Pi automatically whenever it is rebooted. You can find out more in this guide to DHCP.

To change Raspberry Pi OS’s behavior so that it uses the same static IP address each time, you will need to modify the configuration file for the DHCP client daemon, dhcpcd.conf.

Before that, you will need some information on your current network setup so you can add the required details to the configuration file. You will require the following info:

• The type of network connection. This is either wlan0 if your Raspberry Pi is connected to the router wirelessly, or eth0 if it’s connected using an Ethernet cable.
• The Raspberry Pi’s currently assigned IP address – it’s safest to reuse this for its static IP so that you can be sure the latter hasn’t already been to another device on the network. If not, make sure another device isn’t already using it.

To find the Raspberry Pi’s current IP address, do the following:

1. Press CTRL+W to exit out of the SmartSign2go window.
2. Press CTRL+ALT+T to open a terminal window
3. Type “hostname -I” and press enter.

• Your router’s gateway IP address – the one used to contact it from the local network, not its public IP. It varies depending on the router model, but typically starts with 192.168.

To find it, type “ip r | grep default” and press enter.

Note the first IP address given:

Your router’s DNS (Domain Name System) IP address. This is typically the same as its gateway address, but may be set to another value to use an alternative DNS – such as 8.8.8.8 for Google, or 1.1.1.1 for Cloudflare.

To find the current DNS IP address, type “sudo nano /etc/resolv.conf”

Note the IP address after nameserver – that’s the DNS address – and then press Ctrl + X to close the file.

2. Add static IP settings

Now you have found all your network connection information, it’s time to edit the dhcpcd.conf configuration file to add the settings you need to set up a static IP address for your Raspberry Pi

Type “sudo nano /etc/dhcpcd.conf” and hit enter.

If you haven’t edited the file previously, it will mainly contain various comment lines preceded by a hash (#) symbol. At the bottom, add the following lines, replacing the emboldened names with your own network details as noted below. You may instead delete all lines in the file and just this information:

Replace the emboldened names as follows:

NETWORK – your network connection type: eth0 (Ethernet) or wlan0 (wireless).

STATIC_IP – the static IP address you want to set for the Raspberry Pi.

ROUTER_IP – the gateway IP address for your router on the local network.

DNS_IP – the DNS IP address (typically the same as your router’s gateway address).

Here is an example configuration to set the static IP to 192.168.1.120 with a wireless connection to a router at 192.168.1.254:

Once you have entered the settings, press Ctrl + X and then Y and ENTER to close and save the modified configuration file.

3. Reboot the Raspberry Pi

With the dhcpcd.conf configuration file modified, restart your Raspberry Pi to effect the changes and set the static IP address for it.

Type “sudo reboot” to reboot the device.

Rather than using an address assigned automatically by DHCP, the Raspberry Pi will now attempt to connect to the router using the new static IP address that you set in the dhcpcd.conf file. To check that it is working correctly, type “hostname -I” and hit enter.

You should now see the static IP address that you set in the dhcpcd.conf configuration file.

Congratulations: you have set up a static IP address on your Raspberry Pi!

Device Reset

There is no reset procedure per se for the Raspberry Pi 4B (Lite Player). If you are experiencing erratic behavior, it is most commonly due to the following reasons:

• Incorrect power source (always use the stock power supply that came with your Lite player
• Network blockages (content filter in your router blocking one or more of our server URLs)
• Running a more complex playlist than the device can handle (i.e. too long and/or too much video usage)
• Attempting to run videos at 4K resolution. This device cannot play video at 4K smoothly and it may crash.

If none of the above solve your problem then the operating system stored on the SD card may be corrupt. The solution is to write a fresh copy of the OS to the SD card. For that, you can follow the steps in our knowledgebase help article. The Lite model that we sell uses a high performance Flirc case, so you can use the overclocked image file we reference for best performance.