If you’re a PC enthusiast you probably like to keep track of your systems stats while you’re working or playing.
With games this always meant you had to keep an overlay program running, which can get in the way of, you know, actually gaming.
Thankfully it’s shockingly easy to setup a second display to show all this information for you, and all you need is a Raspberry Pi, a compatible screen and about 15 minutes.
Props to this guide go to the guys over at ModBros who created this software.
You Will Need…
- A Raspberry Pi
- A compatible screen
- A case, PSU and SD Card
- A working computer with an SD card reader
- A network cable or a WiFi network
- About 15 minutes
For my build I used the official Raspberry Pi screen and a compatible case, but theoretically any compatible screen will work with the Raspberry Pi. I find this solution looks the neatest perched on a desk and you can check out my Amazon store for the hardware I used in this build.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/techmadeeasy
https://www.amazon.com/shop/techmadeeasy
Software Installation
The first step is to install the MoBro software on your PC. The server software can be found here and is a straightforward installation.
Next, you’ll need to download the MoBros client software for your Raspberry Pi and install it.
Download the software here.
Download the Raspberry Pi Imager here.
Insert the SD card in your PC’s card reader and open the Raspberry Pi Imager software:
Click CHOOSE OS and then scroll down and select Use Custom:
Then select the downloaded MoBros client software image file.
Click the CHOOSE SD CARD button and select your SD card from the list.
Click WRITE.
Once the Imager software has finished writing the SD card click OK and then remove the SD card.
Raspberry Pi Setup
This section applies to the specific hardware I used (which is linked to above). If you’re using a different monitor setup then you’ll need to refer to the instructions that came with your monitor.
Insert the SD card containing the MoBro software into your Raspberry Pi.
Mount the Raspberry Pi on top of the Pi Screen’s PCB using the standoff’s provided
Connect the Raspberry Pi Screen ribbon cable to the display header on the Raspberry Pi
Connect the 5V and Ground GPIO pins of the Raspberry Pi to the 5V and Ground pins of the screen PCB using the jumper wires provided with the screen.
Mount the screen and Pi inside the case (give it a wiggle, it’s a tight fit) and screw secure the screen using the provided screws.
<Optionally> connect the network cable to the Pi’s network port and your home router
Connect the Raspberry Pi PSU to the Micro-USB port on the Rasberry Pi
If you’re using a wired network connection then after it’s booted you should find that the software on the Raspberry Pi automatically detects the server application on your PC and displays the default information.
If you’re using WiFi then you have one further step to complete.
Connect to the hotspot generated by the Raspberry Pi from another device and navigate to the IP Address shown.
Follow the on screen instructions to connect your Raspberry Pi to your WiFi network, you should then see the default information from your server.
Customisation
Any changes you want to make to the display on the Raspberry Pi are conducted on the server app:
By default this shows the above information. To change the statistics shown click on the Settings button in the bottom right corner.
From here you can add new widgets, or change existing ones.
When you’ve finished making changes, click the Tick in the bottom right corner to commit the changes.
If you want to change the theme of the Raspberry Pi display, click on the Connected DEVICES tab:
Then click on the Settings cog for the Raspberry Pi Device:
You can then select the theme of your choice from the dropdown menu!
You can check out my video on this project below:
Hi, Running Windows 10,
downloaded mobro_v11_1.7z,
RPi Imager said:-
“Error extracting archive: Current client reader does not
support reading a device
Just seen this. You need to extract the .7z file using a compression tool like 7zip or Winrar before you can use the file.
So the one thing that’s never mentioned is WHICH Pi to use?
As it turns out, you can technically use any Pi that has a network connection, even a Pi Zero W / 2 W. However, the Pi3 and Pi4 series are better suited to this project, due to the graphic-intensive nature of the display.
Also, you don’t technically need to use the dedicated Pi image they provide. If you already have a Pi running Pi OS desktop, you can get this running through the browser instead! Just install the server component on the PC side, then on the Pi, in a web browser, go to [PC_IP_ADDRESS]:42100?uuid=pi1&name=RaspberryPi (the UUID can be anything you like, but need to be unique for each device connecting to the server).
I found this whole project really handy, where I could quickly switch between my touch controls for my day job, and PC stats monitoring while gaming or working other dev projects with my system, because it’s all browser-based.
Thanks very much for calling this project out!