Picade X HAT USB-C

by Pimoroni

Turn your Raspberry Pi into a retro games console! Picade X HAT includes joystick and button inputs, a 3W I2S DAC/amplifier, and soft power switch. Nice!

Picade X HAT is now Raspberry Pi 4 compatible, with USB-C power!

This HAT has all the same great features as the original Picade HAT but now has no-fuss female Dupont connectors to hook up your joystick and buttons.

Simply pop Picade X HAT onto your Pi, plug a USB-C power supply into the connector on the HAT (it back-powers your Pi through the GPIO, so no need for a separate power supply), wire up your controls, and install our driver! It's ideal for your own DIY arcade cabinet builds, or for interfaces that need big, colourful buttons and sound.

We'd recommend also picking up one of our new Picade wiring looms to go with Picade X HAT. It has all the cables you'll need to connect up buttons and a joystick (with 5-pin connector) to Picade X HAT.

Features

  • I2S audio DAC with 3W amplifier (mono) and push-fit terminals
  • Safe power on/off system with tactile power button and LED
  • USB-C connector for power (back-powers your Pi)
  • 4-way digital joystick inputs
  • 6x player button inputs
  • 4x utility button inputs
  • 1x soft power switch input
  • 1x power LED output
  • Plasma button connector
  • Breakout pins for power, I2C, and 2 additional buttons
  • Picade X HAT pinout
  • Compatible with Raspberry Pi computers with 40 pin header
  • Python library

The I2S DAC blends both channels of digital audio from the Raspberry Pi into a single mono output. This is then passed through a 3W amplifier to power a connected speaker.

The board also features a soft power switch that allows you turn your Pi on and off safely without risk of SD card corruption. Tap the connected button to start up, and press and hold it for 3 seconds to fully shutdown and disconnect power.

Software

We've put together a simple one-line installer that'll get everything set up on your Picade X HAT, the controls, safe shutdown, and audio. Open a terminal and type curl https://get.pimoroni.com/picadehat | bash to run the installer. You'll need to reboot once the installation is complete, if it doesn't prompt you to do so.

Notes

With USB-C power connected through Picade X HAT you'll need either to tap the connected power button or the button marked "switch" on the HAT to power on your Pi.