Raspberry Pi video looper

As I am somewhat of an old-tech enthusiast, I have a small collection of old televisions - CRT televisions to be more specific.

Although bulky, power-hungry and low-res compared to the TV sets of today, there is something nostalgic and wonderful about using these sets. I like to watch old TV shows, or try to Pan-and-Scan my own videos to the 4:3 format.

Luckily, you can easily watch digital media files on these televisions by the use of the a Raspberry Pi, the Swiss army knife of any DIY project.

What you need:

• A Raspberry Pi, any model will do.
• A microSD card of at least 8GB.
• A USB flash drive to store your media files.
• A composite or TRRS->composite video cable, depending on your Raspberry Pi model.

If you have one of the earlier models of Raspberry Pi, you may have a composite connector soldered directly onto the board. In that case, you can use a standard composite video cable to connect the Raspberry Pi to your TV, and then another 3.5mm to RCA cable to transmit the audio to the television set.

On later models of Raspberry Pi, you will have to use to the 3.5mm audio jack for the transmission of both audio and video. In this case, you will need a TRRS->composite cable that a yellow, red and white connector. You can find them for cheap on eBay, and - if you are lucky - your local electronics store may even have them in stock. If you have an old video camera lying around, a similar cable likely came bundled with it. Keep in mind though that the connectors on these camera cables may have been switched, so that the red connector is video instead the yellow and so on.

Once you have acquired the appropriate cables, go ahead and download the latest image from this website: https://videolooper.de/

The latest image should support all Raspberry Pi models.

Flash the image to your microSD card using a tool of your choice. If you are on a Windows machine, I recommend BalenaEtcher or RawWrite. If you're on Linux you can also use BalenaEtcher, although I prefer just using dd. The same applies if you are using a Mac.

Once you have everything hooked up, switch the television set to composite and power up the Raspberry Pi. After a few seconds you should see console output on your screen. Once the screen turns black it is ready to accept a USB flash drive. Insert the flash drive containg your video files (I recommend using only H264 MP4s), and the Raspberry Pi will immediately start playing them one by one, looping through them indefinitely.

You now have a simple way to easily watch episodes of your favourite 80s TV show, or demo your retro TV collection!

What if I don't have a composite input on my TV?

If your TV does not have a composite input, and instead only features an RF connector, you can still use this approach. All you need is a composite to RF modulator. These can be found for around $8-15 dollars (80-150 NOK) on eBay or other online electronics stores. You will only need an additional USB power supply to power the modulator as well as a the appropriate RF cable for your set. This should require no additional setup other than tuning your TV to the right channel.