Getting Started with HyperPixel 4.0

2023-12-28 | By Pimoroni

License: General Public License

Guide by Pimoroni

In this tutorial, we'll look at how to set up and use your shiny new HyperPixel ‎‎4.0. It's all fairly straightforward. Note that you'll need a keyboard, mouse, ‎and keyboard to set the software up, and a Phillips screwdriver to attach the ‎metal standoffs to your Pi.‎

When you open your HyperPixel 4.0 box, you'll find the following:‎

HyperPixel 4.0 PCB and display
standoff kit with 4x metal standoffs and 4x screws
female header

We'll start with how to attach your HyperPixel 4.0 to your Raspberry Pi. These ‎instructions apply to the larger Raspberry Pi models, and we'll cover what to ‎do with a Zero or Zero W after.‎

Attaching your HyperPixel 4.0 to your Raspberry Pi

Note: You should all of the following section with your Pi powered off.‎

The first thing to note is that your HyperPixel 4.0 screen has a protective film ‎on the screen. It's best to leave this on while you're attaching it, to prevent ‎accidentally scratching the glass.‎

On the underside of your HyperPixel, you'll see four silver metal mounting ‎posts that have little orange pieces of film on. Peel the pieces of film off, and ‎then screw the threaded ends of the four black metal standoffs into the four ‎mounting posts.‎

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The female extended header that comes with your HyperPixel 4.0 lifts it high ‎enough to clear the USB and ethernet ports at the right-hand side of your Pi. ‎Push the male end of the extended header into the female header on your ‎HyperPixel firmly, until it's all the way in.‎

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Now, push the extended header on your HyperPixel 4.0 onto your Pi's GPIO ‎pins, making sure not to press on the centre of the HyperPixel's display but ‎instead holding the edges of the display and PCB and pressing gently but ‎firmly. Make sure that both headers are aligned properly; you can check this ‎by looking at the alignment of the standoffs with the mounting holes on the ‎Pi.‎

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Flip your Pi over and secure the standoffs with the four metal screws, using a ‎Phillips screwdriver. You can peel the film off the front of the display now if ‎you wish.‎

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Using it with a Raspberry Pi Zero or Zero W

If you're using a Raspberry Pi Zero or Zero W, then you won't need to use the ‎additional extended header, and just plug it straight onto the pins!‎

Setting up your Raspberry Pi

Download Raspbian with desktop and then use Etcher to burn the operate ‎system onto a micro SD card that's at least 8GB. We sell a NOOBS micro SD ‎card that comes pre-loaded with a range of operating systems, including ‎Raspbian, so if you're not sure what you're doing then you could grab one of ‎them instead.‎

You'll need an HDMI display, keyboard and mouse connected for the next ‎part, until the HyperPixel installation is complete, or you could follow ‎our guide on how to set up a Raspberry Pi headlessly, and then use SSH to ‎install the HyperPixel software.‎

Pop the micro-SD card with Raspbian installed into the slot on the underside ‎of your Pi and plug your power supply into the micro USB port; the Pi should ‎start booting up.‎

You'll need to be connected to the internet with either an ethernet cable ‎plugged into the ethernet socket on your Pi, or to a Wi-Fi network. If you're ‎booting into Raspbian for the first time, then it will guide you on connecting to ‎Wi-Fi.‎

Installing the HyperPixel 4.0 software

‎⚠️Changes are afoot! If you're using the latest, greatest version of Raspberry ‎Pi OS Bullseye dated 04/04/2022 or later it will come with Hyperpixel drivers ‎baked in - find out more at the link below:‎

PSA: HyperPixel 4 (Square & Rectangular) on Raspberry Pi OS 2022-04-04‎

For instructions for the legacy installer, read on!⚠️‎

We've put together a nifty one-line installer for the HyperPixel 4.0 software ‎that'll get everything configured properly for you. If you're an advanced user, ‎and you'd like to know what the code is doing, then you can look at ‎the GitHub repository and the install.sh script.‎

Open a terminal window, and then type the following and press enter:‎

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curl https://get.pimoroni.com/hyperpixel4 | bash

The installer may prompt you to type y or n and press enter at various points ‎and, if it asks you whether you'd like to reboot once it's finished, then ‎type y to reboot.‎

Once rebooted, your HyperPixel display should be displaying the Raspbian ‎desktop! Try touching the touchscreen if you're using the Touch version of ‎HyperPixel 4.0.‎

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If you're not bothered about using I2C, then you're done! If you want to learn ‎more, then read on!‎

Using the alternate I2C interface on HyperPixel 4.0 (for ‎advanced users)‎

HyperPixel 4.0 uses literally all of the GPIO pins on the Raspberry Pi, including ‎the standard I2C pins (BCM 2 and 3), but we've broken out pins BCM 10 and ‎‎11 as well as 3V3 power and ground, so that you can use I2C devices at the ‎same time as using your HyperPixel 4.0.‎

You can use some jumper jerky to connect I2C devices to your HyperPixel ‎‎4.0, using the 5-pin female header on the underside of the board. If you're ‎using our Pimoroni breakouts then you can solder a piece of right-angle male ‎header on and plug them straight in, or even use one of our Breakout Garden ‎Extender sockets and just plug them straight in.‎

The nifty trick to using the alternate I2C interface is to symlink i2c-3 to i2c-1 to ‎fool any I2C devices into talking to the alternate one rather than the standard ‎one. Open a terminal, and type:‎

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sudo ln -s /dev/i2c-3 /dev/i2c-1‎

Now any software libraries that use I2C should talk to i2c-3 rather than to i2c-1, ‎meaning that you don't have to meddle with the software libraries ‎themselves.‎

If you want to undo this, you can simply delete the i2c-1 symlink file by typing ‎in the terminal:‎

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