“Slip the shim over the GPIO header and add the overlay parameter to config.txt and it works.
Until now I have used the plug-in DAC board that prevents further use of the GPIO and adds to the overall height, but at a very reasonable price for the performance. This shim fits inside a standard case and allows GPIO access without loss of audio performance. The only drawback is that a hole must be drilled in the case for the Line Out socket.
All this performance, flexibility and convenience at a great price.”
“I am using a sandwich of RPIZERO, AUDIOSHIM and Pirateaudio running on volumio OS V3.616 as a music streaming interradio device. A nice small package which can play music from all over the world
Carl Blyh in Helsinki”
“The instructions on the product page are different from the ones on the github page, which are also different from the ones on the hifiberry manufacturer page. It took a lot of mesing about with the drivers before I got any signs of life (save yourself some hassle and just straight to hifeberry as those are correct and work)
Then the cheap friction-fit thing simply does not work. The only way I could ever get this to work was to awkwardly press the shim in certain directions and even then it was intermittent. They tell you the GPIO pins, but only "a few grounds" so you end up having to solder everything because you don't know which gorunds are used and which not. Not great - I would have preferred to pay the extra 20p to get a proper socket.
Then finally when you do get all the drivers sorted and all the pins soldered, the output is hissy and fuzzy on some power-supplies (yes, even "good" ones that do not cause warnings otherwise) so you have to go through your collection of power supplies to find a "compatible" one before you get a clean and non-noisy output.
Really disappointed.”
Ahoy!
Sorry to hear this didn't work out for you - drop us an email at support@pimoroni.com if you'd like us to send you our returns details.
Tolerances at the Pi and the SHIM end can both affect the success of the friction fit, so a soldered connection will always be the most solid.
“I got this to utilise an old Pi 2 as a soft synth with a midi controller. The device was recognised by Minidex and everything worked with just a quick edit to the config file.”
“I've had 5 of these shim devices now and only one has worked without issue. The problem is that the fit over the Pi's GPIO pins is too loose and good contact could only be made by soldering. Sorry to moan - I wish it worked better but I will avoid these in future”
“Only just hooked it up - but it works and sounds great!
Used it with shairport sync to make some speakers AirPlay compatible for much less than retail solutions.
thanks!”
