Two issues running Beatnik on Pi 5 with Focusrite Scarlett Solo

[yurivangeffen]

Just found your project on Reddit and I love it! Immediately picked up a Raspberry Pi to get my spare Focusrite Solo + KRK Rokits running on Beatnik!

I tried installing on a clean Pi 8GB with 128 SD card (with Trixie Lite) and using a Focusrite Scarlett Solo with one of two KRK Rokits connected. Install process was smooth in general. I did have to set up a config for the Solo in /etc/asound.conf to get it to output sound using Airplay:

pcm.scarlett32 {
  type plug
  slave {
    pcm "hw:0,0"
    format S32_LE
  }
}

pcm.!default {
  type plug
  slave.pcm "scarlett32"
}

ctl.!default {
  type hw
  card 0
}

I think it has something to do with the Solo needing 32-bit audio? Shouldn't be a problem with "supported devices" like the HifiBerry.

Unfortunately, Spotify streaming had some deeper trouble;

1. Beatnik showed up in my Spotify output selection no problem.

2. Selected the output channel but got no sound from speakers, even though Spotify tells me it's "playing".

3. Checked beatnik controller, which shows 0 clients, and 1 stream playing:

5. Hacked my way around using ChatGPT, knowing nothing much of audio drivers and UNIX pipes. Found a fix by replacing the Spotify stream in /etc/snapserver.conf with:

[stream]
source = process:///usr/bin/librespot?name=Spotify&devicename=Beatnik-Spotify&bitrate=320

6. After rebooting, this changed the way the output channel was shown in Spotify, but made the stream work:

Of course, the above fix breaks the connection between Beatnik and librespot, the stream now seems "idle" in the interface even when it's in use:

Do you know of a way to get this working within Beatnik instead of around it? Very willing to test a clean install again if you have some pointers as to what the issue could be!

Just working the problem...

[Idrimi]

Hi,

thanks a lot & nice to see that you got it running more or less.

For the spotify issue: could it be that after the fix, you’re spawning multiple librespot connections?
Snapcast spawns it’s own librespot instance if you have it defined it in the snapserver.conf (i see you found that).

Considering your screenshots i think that you probably had it running initially. I think you just did not assign the stream to the client. You can do that by clicking on the client/device, then choose the stream. (see screenshots)

I think the best option to solve your issues:

Fresh installation using Camilla DSP. If use camillaDSP you have quite some options to adapt it your hardware: See here: https://github.com/byrdsandbytes/beatnik-pi/blob/master/camilla-dsp.md#42-add-the-configuration


As the Camilla DSP Pipeline is quite some configuration work, you can try the shell script installation here: https://github.com/byrdsandbytes/beatnik-pi/blob/master/Installation-guide.md
It will guide you through snapcast, spotify and camillaDSP setup.

After the installation you will find a camillaDSP folder which will have a base config you can adapt. ({YOURUSER}/camillaDSP/configs/client-config.yml)

I hope that helps and nice wood desk you got there. ;)

[yurivangeffen]

I did some more testing and debugging, reinstalling the Pi a couple of times. I might've found some issues that could be the reason it hasn't been working out of the box. I'll try to detail them here as best I can. Please let me know if I should split them into multiple issues.

1. No automatic reboot

It seems altough the install scripts mentions automatic restarting, it doesn't actually reboot. This is a small issue, but it did lead me to the next issue.

2. USB device seems to move around

Initially, after installing (before reboot), I tested if the amp was properly found. This seemed to be the case:

beatnik@beatnik-server:~ $ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: USB [Scarlett Solo USB], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio] <<< Scarlett Solo as card 0
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: vc4hdmi0 [vc4-hdmi-0], device 0: MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0 [MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 2: vc4hdmi1 [vc4-hdmi-1], device 0: MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0 [MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 3: Loopback [Loopback], device 0: Loopback PCM [Loopback PCM]
  Subdevices: 8/8
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
  Subdevice #4: subdevice #4
  Subdevice #5: subdevice #5
  Subdevice #6: subdevice #6
  Subdevice #7: subdevice #7
card 3: Loopback [Loopback], device 1: Loopback PCM [Loopback PCM]
  Subdevices: 8/8
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
  Subdevice #4: subdevice #4
  Subdevice #5: subdevice #5
  Subdevice #6: subdevice #6
  Subdevice #7: subdevice #7 

Using speaker-test -c2 -t wav also outputed sound correctly.
Then I rebooted the Pi (since it didn't automatically). I rechecked aplay -l, and it seemed to have moved the USB device to card 1:

beatnik@beatnik-server:~ $ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Loopback [Loopback], device 0: Loopback PCM [Loopback PCM]
  Subdevices: 8/8
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
  Subdevice #4: subdevice #4
  Subdevice #5: subdevice #5
  Subdevice #6: subdevice #6
  Subdevice #7: subdevice #7
card 0: Loopback [Loopback], device 1: Loopback PCM [Loopback PCM]
  Subdevices: 8/8
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
  Subdevice #4: subdevice #4
  Subdevice #5: subdevice #5
  Subdevice #6: subdevice #6
  Subdevice #7: subdevice #7
card 1: USB [Scarlett Solo USB], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 2: vc4hdmi0 [vc4-hdmi-0], device 0: MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0 [MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 3: vc4hdmi1 [vc4-hdmi-1], device 0: MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0 [MAI PCM i2s-hifi-0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

speaker-test also doesn't seem to work anymore.

In the end I fixed this using:

# /etc/asound.conf 
pcm.scarlett32 {
  type plug
  slave {
    pcm "hw:USB,0"
    format S32_LE
  }
}

pcm.!default {
  type plug
  slave.pcm "scarlett32"
}

ctl.!default {
  type hw
  card "USB"
}

This sets the correct format and links to the USB name instead of a switching card number.

3. Beatnik controller doesn't seem to restart?

Not sure why, but after rebooting the controller doesn't seem to run anymore. docker compose ls doesn't show anything but I can find the image:

beatnik@beatnik-server:~ $ docker ps -a
CONTAINER ID   IMAGE                                             COMMAND                  CREATED          STATUS                      PORTS     NAMES
cc2364f25493   ghcr.io/byrdsandbytes/beatnik-controller:latest   "/docker-entrypoint.…"   37 minutes ago   Exited (0) 35 minutes ago             beatnik-controller

Because it's not running, but my browser still had a cache, it seemed the controller was running fine even though it was not. Restarting the controller manually makes it work again, and running docker update --restart unless-stopped beatnik-controller ensures it also restarts on each reboot.

---

I understand this is quite the braindump, but hopefully it can help make the script more stable. I think if we can work through 1 and 3 it would help others as well. #2 is just a Scarlett Solo issue.

Edit; thanks for the compliment on the kitchen table! Unfortunately my desk is a lot more boring ;)

Edit 2; it is kind of magical having everything running smoothly now 👏 . Getting a HifiBerry HAT and some passive speakers to see how that goes!

[Idrimi]

Good morning and thanks a lot for the feedback. Very useful!

I'm working on a second repo to make the soundcard configurable by the app.
This one here: https://github.com/byrdsandbytes/beatnik-hardware-api

1. Yes you're right, i fiddled around the rebooting logic in the shell script and in some cases it doesn't trigger. (It was triggering to early).

2. Jumping cards/slots. You're right after reboot it should usually be on slot 1. Alsa-Loop back will take 0. But i also try to make this more reliable by defining them more direct. I'm trying that here: https://github.com/byrdsandbytes/beatnik-hardware-api/blob/master/src/types/hats.ts . Not sure if this will be more stable. Have to test.
   Thanks a lot for sharing your config, I started testing the default Raspi ports this week (hdmi 0 and Headphone Jack from 4B) so this will come in handy next week when i test the USB as well.

3. You're right. It's been a while since I had a look at the docker container. Will check. Thanks!

Thanks a lot for the feedback, no need to split it. Perfect like this.
And glad you got it working! Saw the issues Controller thanks a lot for those as well.

[yurivangeffen]

Just some feedback regarding 1: I ran it on a different pi (with Amp4 Pro) and it did reboot, both times that I tried. It's just a bit flaky. Maybe it's the USB flow?

Regarding 2: let me know if you'd like me to run a test on the Focusrite!