Hungry DFPlayer

The DFPlayer Mini is an amazing device. Particularly as you can pick one up for around a pound on AliExpress. It will pull mp3 files off a MicroSD card (which is the most expensive part of the system) and play them for you. It outputs good quality stereo and even includes an amplifier that will drive a pair of speakers up to useful levels.

I’m using it in a device that I’m building. I’ve got a Raspberry Pi PICO triggering the audio playback over a serial connection. I loaded an MP3 file onto the SD card for testing. I used the track Fireflies from Owl City for no particular reason. The music started playing, which pleased me. Then, around 20 seconds in the drums and the bass kicked in and the whole thing crashed. Which did not please me.

It’s a power supply thing of course. I was powering it from a USB port on my PC which is a bit weak. I switched to a different port and it worked fine. There’s an important lesson here that I’ve mentioned before. If you’re making something and it starts to misbehave try a different power source.