I have been searching everywhere and can’t find any reliable info on adding a power button to either Picade or Raspberry Pi 3 build b. There also seems to be various schools of thought on whether or not you need to safely shut down, and considering I’m building a Picade from scratch with just the picade board and all my own other stuff, I was hoping I could get you guys to chime in on:
A) How do I wire a button to Picade or RPi3b to invoke shut down, and
B) Is this even necessary if I’m using Retropie? Any concerns with just shutting off the power strip this is plugged into?
Thanks in advance for your help!
Hi
I use an ATXRaspi in mine with a non latching switch. I got mine from here
http://lowpowerlab.com/atxraspi/
Photo below (the small PCB behind the top right corner of the Pi - not the one on the GPIO)
https://forums.pimoroni.com/uploads/short-url/mykXR4s6RmOuuxLMZV8nCw99oWq.jpeg
Other folks use the PowerBlock available from here
Cheers
Paul
From that link on petrockblog: “This means that there is no need anymore to plug and unplug the USB cable from the Raspberry if you want to completely and safely turn it off.”
This implies that I really don’t need a power switch, and that flipping the switch on the power strip should suffice. No word about unplugging the power being unsafe at all. Considering Picade doesn’t even have one, I’m wondering if the corruption risk is a myth.
Hi
You’ve misread that and you will corrupt your card (maybe not everytime you do it) if you just pull the power but it’s your choice.
if you use RetroPie then you can get away without one provided you always shutdown from the emulation station menu.
Cheers
Paul
If it’s such a big risk, then what is the Picade’s solution for this? AFAIK, there’s no power button interface on the board. Seriously, nobody has been able to tie the shutdown command to a simple button without another $20 accessory?? This is absurd.
Hi
Yes you can use a simple button to shutdown if you want.
This however won’t allow you to use one button to switch the unit on and off which is what the add on boards do.
Cheers
Paul
Paul, thank you. This is exactly what I was looking for.
This won’t be a problem since I’m building a cabinet with its own power strip and on/off switch connected to the power strip. Power for all devices will be controlled with that switch.
There is a risk in theory, but I’ve been using Pis since they came out, pulling the plug out without ever safely shutting down and I haven’t lost anything yet.
One day soon though, I probably will and that’s when I’ll start using safe shutdown!
Hi
A colleague at work has a Pi downloading from a weather station and everytime there is a power cut his SD card gets corrupted. Strangely mine doing exactly the same doesn’t so it may be down to the type and manufacturer of the card.
Cheers
Paul
Weird… Could be down to any number of factors (configuration, manufacturer, whether it’s always using the card or not…) Be interesting to do some experiments on this.
