John! My man! I can’t hardly believe you just replied to my past comment on a prior video from a year ago! Thank you so much, sir. You’re the absolute man! PLEASE keep the content rolling. You’re one of the best, right up there with ETA Prime and Russ from Retro Game Corps.
It's an honor to be mentioned alongside two of the greats, I thank you for that! I truly owe this video to the Batocera team that made some impressive improvements that made the PK A12/13 so much better. If it wasn't for their hard work this video wouldn't have been possible. I also want to thank you for your kind comments, you were my inspiration to re-visit the PK A12/13 with the latest version of Batocera (v36). I didn't forget about you.
Doing it tonight, so thanks again for the wonderful video!! Batocera itself is a joy on any device, but gaming is made all the easier, thanks to the nice work & dedication of countless developers! The A13 had nice work already done by Team Ruka, Batocera just more welcome addition & edition for users everywhere!
Very welcome and definitely agree! All the developers that spend their free time creating and enhancing Batocera and the emulators that run on it deserve our thanks! I greatly appreciate all they have done for the retro gaming community and honored to demonstrate their hard work.
i watching this to understand how to install batocera A13/A12. however, there is a fourth way. first use rufu or etc to flush batocera to the new SD card. after that copy the entire file to harddisc for the user partition for backup. after that go and for format the user partition. next , reformat your user area as fat32, extfat or nfts format. next copy the user partition from the copy to the sd card. finally, your user partition can easily add games.
yes. the paragon file system trial version i use last only 10 days. therefore when i reformat to NFTS, i dont worry the paragon unix file system expire
I was getting ready to dump my A13 as I hadn't done anything with it since I got it years ago. I still need to mod it and do this firmware improvement or sell it. One or the other. I was highly surprised to see it pop up this long after it came out. Thanks for the video.
It has been at least a year since I picked up the A13 and two for the A12. The latest version of Batocera worked really well on both. It seemed like a worthwhile video to make and hope it's helpful 😎👍
Duck Taping the SD card is genius! Lol! Great video Jon! The Powkiddy looks interesting but does seem a little bulky. How heavy is it? Any issues with the joystick?
Lol, thanks Mike! I'm constantly losing these microSD cards and out of necessity decided to tape it to the back :) The A12 is a little more bulky than the A13 but both are relatively small machines about 10"x7" and stand about 8" tall and rather light. Sticks work/feel good, very clicky. They aren't the most powerful machines today by any means. If you just want something small that can play most arcade and consoles up to PS1 (anything beyond that is hit or miss), I think they are worth the price. Adding Batocera definitely made them more fun to play!
Excellent video. I am planning on using at least two SD cards for games. Do I have to copy the Batocera boot image to each and every SD card in order to run them? If that is the case, will the config be saved to each SD card that the boot image is on so that it will remember my settings when swapping out cards? Your advice would be really helpful as I am going to attempt installing the firmware in the next few days. Thanks.
If you plan on running games on multiple microSD cards, then yes you'd need the Batocera OS installed on each + games. I personally would use a larger card and only install to a single card. Then, once everything is exactly how you want it, make a backup of it (just incase of corruption). More details on how to backup/clone a drive can be found here, if you need it: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/
Hey Alan, very welcome! Well, partially. You can safely shutdown by pressing Start->Quit->Shutdown to close open files, etc. But you'll still need to press the power on/off switch to totally kill power to the machine.
This video was extremely helpful. I'm hoping you could help me with a question, I am trying to find out how to open the emulation station menu inside of a game on the a12 with botacera. I just cannot find the button combination to be able to bring up the menu to access save states and such! Thank you!
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK. Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
Batocera finally got me to pull out my a13 again, I'm struggling to get pico-8 to work with the official version though, I've followed the instructions added the rasp version to bios and added the cfg file to the emulationstation but when I try load a game it just boots back into the menu.
My guess is it's missing the bios or the correct bios version. You can run the 'Missing BIOS Check' to verify. If you still have issues, you can reach out on the Batocera Discord or subreddit here: wagnerstechtalk.com/pc-batocera/#Resources . That same page has a lot of Batocera info., mostly for the PC but much of it is applicable to the A13.
it's a pretty niche system on an already rarer system so no-one seemed to know. So I just brute forced and tried a bunch of different versions, turns out the dyn version included with the raspberry pi version was all I needed to swap in place for the 32bit version@@WagnersTechTalk
Hello! I am having these issues with Batocera with the Powkiddy a12: 1. can't get a wifi dongle to work 2. can't get a external usb controller to be recognized (8-bit do xbox pro 2 wired controller) 3. HDMI out won't work
The dongle shown in this video worked for me. Perhaps it's having difficulty negotiating with your router. On my network, I have 2.4/5Ghz separated into two different SSID's. I connect to the 2.4Ghz here, perhaps something to try. I was able to get a few controllers to work in ES, but during game play they didn't function (only the internal controls). HDMI Output worked here as long as the HDMI connection was connected before powering on. After that, HDMI out worked.
Thanks for this very interesting. Am I right in saying if you put the old original stock SD card back, the A12 reverts to what it was before with its original out the box OS and games etc ...... as the OS is on the card, and there is nothing internal in the A12 that is affected ?
Very welcome and yes, that's why in this video we kept the original card safe (taped it to the back). That way, if we ever want to go back to stock, we can.
So i have installed Batocera however my screen is not allied properly, its Batocra is by defult set too a higher resolution so i have a quarter of my screen cut of in games. Any ideas has how to change the resoultion?
Should be able to go into settings and change the display resolution. If you can see the screen good, you can also power it off, then connect an HDMI cable to your TV/Monitor and power it on and should be able to see the screen to change the resolution that way. Let me know if that doesn't help, I can take a look (I've not updated in awhile).
@@WagnersTechTalk When i connect via hdmi it is the right resloution on a 1920x1080 display, However when go back to the PK i only have 1920x1080 or 640x480 or 1024x600, they are the only 3 resolution i can choose from. Thereis also and a staggering amount aspect ratio's. Im thinking maybe i have to go to the config file loadcted on the sd card and manually set a resolution for retroarch or Batocera Ini? not sure what the Pk resolution would be though
The Flashing Bug of the Powkiddy A13 Display is fixed by Formating the Share Partition to NTFS. But before Format Copy all Folders to a Location so you can Copy it back after NTFS Format. No Flickering
So can i just swap back to my stock backed up sd card after installing Batocera? Or once Batocrea is run on the PK the stock sd card wont run the old firmware? I guess what im asking is " is the firmware just run off the sd card so i can swap form batocrea to original just by swapping cards:"
Whenever i tried to enter the retroarch menu, the game would quit and return to the emulation station. It doesn't happen in V33, but after I update to V35 (then V39), I can't enter the retroarch menu anymore. Any solution?
Thank you for your response Its appeared that because the hotkey button to the return button. I simply just need to reassign it to select button and the the problem solved.
Hi love the vid. I am hoping someone can help me though. I have installed batacero on my a12 and added rom however nothing displays properly right from boot up the screen us stretch and in game the screen is stretched so I do not see the full image tried every different res and aspect ratio and does not solve the problem please help
I installed it on my A13, the only issue is that theres no hotkey for opening retroarch menu during game play, the back button on the A13 exits the game back to the home screen, do you know of any reaolution to this?
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK. Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
I have not, it's on my todo list but I've been tied up on other projects and haven't investigated. If you figure something out before I do, let me know please 😎
For mine, I will have screen freezes when I change games. At this point I would need to just switch the unit off and back on again. I have used two different branded legit SD cards, it seems to be the same. Could it be my A12 hardware itself? Heated up or faulty sd card slot?
It seems to depend on the type of games you play. I mostly use it for playing Arcade (MAME) games and it works well. If it freezes up, it's likely that the game(s) you're trying to play may require more hardware resources than are available with the device.
Kind of a last ditch effort asking here, but having issues getting games/emulators to recognize a second controller on batocera... It reads it fine in the main menu navigation screen (I can even navigate screen with a second controller) however when I enter a game/emulator it completely stops reading it... tried to map it via quick menu in game, doesnt register face buttons... Tried asking reddit no luck. Sorry to ask in chat but have no idea what to do
In this build on the A12/13 I ran into the same thing when trying an external controller. It would work fine while in the menu, but once in a game it wouldn't recognize the external controller. Pretty sure we're not both wrong, may need a future update from the Batocera team for this. You may want to check their Discord (links here wagnerstechtalk.com/pc-batocera/#Resources ) and see if there is a work-around. If you find one, let me know please. I didn't dig into this issue as I only had one other person asking about it.
I have 2 powkiddy A12s one for me and one for my son, when I put a micro SD with Batocera on my son's it doesn't appear centered and the resolution is wrong. Can you help me change the screen resolution?
go into SYSTEM SETTINGS -> VIDEO OUTPUT and make sure it's set for AUTO. Then go into USER INTERFACE MODE and make sure it's set for FULL. That should be it. Worst-case, if not you can clone your microSD to his microSD. It will take more time to do, but here's how to do it if you want to: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/#Backup_Clone_a_Drive . You can likely skip the 'Expand a partition' option, if the cards are both the same size.
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK. Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
Tried this on my a13, but mine won't start/black screen only. I am currently trying to find ways on how to fix my a13. The day I got it, after a few games, the TF card, like, imploaded and all games are gone. If you have save files for the stock TF card files, may I kindly ask for a download link please? BTW, my a13 version is ver1.3 zx 230110 edit: tried writing instead of flashing, worked. now my only issue is, IP address shows, but internet not connected.
Happy you got it! For the internet, back out/in a few times (or more) to see if the status changed. Sometimes it takes time to register and doesn't update the UI that internet is available. That part is a little wonky.
@@WagnersTechTalk internet now connects. Prob is, I can't access batocera in the network. So i used free trial of linux fs. Also, why can't it connect to HD TV?? It has an option to switch screens once you plug the hd cable, but its not working.
@@clariceedward27 I mention that in this video. Make sure you power off the machine first, connect the HDMI to the back of the machine and power it on. Then you can set the video output.
Today I went to pick up my powkiddy on the 13th and saw that my micro SD no longer works, would anyone have the image or the original factory Chinese system to install:?
Hi John, quick question. Does it have to be a 128gb sd card in order for it to work? I have a 64gb sd card and it can't seem to find it on balena etcher.
It can be any capacity microSD card. Give Pi Imager a try (here's how: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/#Burn_an_Image_with_Raspberry_Pi_Imager ). I prefer Pi Imager for a lot of things and it's useful for more than using it with a Raspberry Pi.
@@WagnersTechTalk Wow, you're right, Raspberry Pi Imager is so much better and I was able to successfully write and install Batocera into my Powkiddy A13! You're the best, John. Thank you so much for helping us fellow gamers. =]
Hello does the functions of the original system still work sutch as hdmi i heard with some other custom system that it dosent also do linux ports work im going to put open beats of rage on there
In this update, you have to have the HDMI cable connected before powering on the PK device. If you do, then it will utilize the external HDMI connection. However, if you just plug it in once powered-on, it won't show up on the external HDMI display. Hope that helps!
I just installed batocera on the a13, but I can't seem to get mega drive to have a custom controller configuration. It seems to lock the arcade buttons on 3 of the same button. Do you know how to set it up?
hello! mr.Wagner's Techtalk I have a question.I have an A12 dev.D. I'm using BOB Batocera36 BOB latest version at the moment. But Dreamcast and PSP Unstable, freezes a lot I searched the net and found I found a test version called Batocera38 for A13 but I don't know if it's supported compatible with A12 /dev.D. Do you know of a Batocera38 for A12 /dev D? This model comes in many monitor sizes. Would it have to be optimized to use it Batocera 38?
The version on the Batocera page is the same as was shown here, v35 (older build). Dreamcast and some PSP won't run well on that CPU, remember it only has 512MB of RAM so larger games, graphically intensive games, etc. aren't going to run well or at all. What will run well are older consoles and arcade games (most of them). There isn't currently a Batocera v38 build for the A12/13. If you hover your mouse over the download link, you'll see in the filename it's v35.
@@WagnersTechTalk Thanks for getting back to me. Here are the results of my test Conditions1（Needs to be charging.） Conditions2（ reboot and only run one game) PSP：CSO files Most games frame rate skipping will stabilize DC: If you set it to CHD files Even with a 1GB game files does not freeze (GDI CDI ALL freeze) If you run and change many games easy freezing increases.
A friend gave me what it seems to be a clone of powkiddy. Its a "Games Power" and it seems to have a rockchip rk312x with a ARMv7 Processor rev5 (v7l). It's Android system it seems? Does anyone know if batocera runs here? I flashed one Batocera v38 to a microSd but it doesnt boot in this "Games Power" machine.
@@WagnersTechTalk i like this system this clone brings.. i just could trade the ppsspp emulator for a psx rearmed. The psp games run very bad but psx would run like a charm. I notice (when I plug a keyboard and mouse) that it is running a android software, the emulators are: vnes, vsfc, vgb, vgba, mame, ppspp, vgen, vgbc.
I'll check it out, but I'm pretty sure I got one of my gamepads working on it (though, it is an obscure NES-style game pad I tested). I'll get back to you.
I have good news and bad news. I was only partially correct. I could map the controller (tried a clone xbox360 and a nes-style gamepad), and could navigate Emulation Station just fine. However after launching a game (Galaga), the controller wouldn't respond, even after setting P1/P2 specifically to the connected controller. I'm not sure if there is a solution for this, I'll mention it to the Batocera devs but can't guarantee a fix/solution.
Not sure what issue you're having, but please see this portion of the guide for RetroPie: wagnerstechtalk.com/rpi4gaming/#Official_RetroPie . If that doesn't help, please let me know the issue you're having.
Thank you for this tutorial. I have everything up and running except for Sega Genesis games. I've tried everything, including changing emulators. Do you have any suggestions?
Don't recall if I tested Sega Genesis games, honestly. I was primarily interested in Arcade games myself. But did test some others. One thing that may be worth trying is check what file types are supported by the emulator (see the .txt file in the folder) and make sure the files you're copying are supported file types. That's all I can think of. If that doesn't help, reach out to the Batocera subreddit and you may get a better answer: www.reddit.com/r/batocera/
A couple of ways, you can copy them manually to the microSD card using DiskGenius (not free), use a linux machine to copy the files or if you have the WiFi adapter mentioned you can scrape the artwork that way.
@@WagnersTechTalk Do you know where we put the images? I'd like to manually add some images for MAME games, but I don't know where to put them on the SD card. Thanks in advance!
One more quick question, I am seeing other USB Dongles that are plug and play with 5GHZ network. Will any of those work? Not a huge deal if not but the 2.4 network speed is probably why the roms were so slow to copy
I can't answer that honestly. I only found the one that worked for me (I only had about 3 I could test). Even with that one, it's not great but usable.
John! My man! I can’t hardly believe you just replied to my past comment on a prior video from a year ago! Thank you so much, sir. You’re the absolute man! PLEASE keep the content rolling. You’re one of the best, right up there with ETA Prime and Russ from Retro Game Corps.
It's an honor to be mentioned alongside two of the greats, I thank you for that! I truly owe this video to the Batocera team that made some impressive improvements that made the PK A12/13 so much better. If it wasn't for their hard work this video wouldn't have been possible. I also want to thank you for your kind comments, you were my inspiration to re-visit the PK A12/13 with the latest version of Batocera (v36). I didn't forget about you.
Doing it tonight, so thanks again for the wonderful video!! Batocera itself is a joy on any device, but gaming is made all the easier, thanks to the nice work & dedication of countless developers! The A13 had nice work already done by Team Ruka, Batocera just more welcome addition & edition for users everywhere!
Very welcome and definitely agree! All the developers that spend their free time creating and enhancing Batocera and the emulators that run on it deserve our thanks! I greatly appreciate all they have done for the retro gaming community and honored to demonstrate their hard work.
Wow wonderful video! You helped me alot! Thanks!! 😊
You're very welcome!!
i watching this to understand how to install batocera A13/A12.
however, there is a fourth way.
first use rufu or etc to flush batocera
to the new SD card.
after that copy the entire file to harddisc for the user partition for backup. after that go and for format the user partition.
next , reformat your user area as fat32, extfat or nfts format.
next copy the user partition from the copy to the sd card.
finally, your user partition can easily add games.
Very nice of you to share this information, much appreciated!
yes. the paragon file system trial version i use last only 10 days. therefore when i reformat to NFTS, i dont worry the paragon unix file system expire
I was getting ready to dump my A13 as I hadn't done anything with it since I got it years ago. I still need to mod it and do this firmware improvement or sell it. One or the other. I was highly surprised to see it pop up this long after it came out. Thanks for the video.
It has been at least a year since I picked up the A13 and two for the A12. The latest version of Batocera worked really well on both. It seemed like a worthwhile video to make and hope it's helpful 😎👍
Duck Taping the SD card is genius! Lol! Great video Jon! The Powkiddy looks interesting but does seem a little bulky. How heavy is it? Any issues with the joystick?
Lol, thanks Mike! I'm constantly losing these microSD cards and out of necessity decided to tape it to the back :) The A12 is a little more bulky than the A13 but both are relatively small machines about 10"x7" and stand about 8" tall and rather light. Sticks work/feel good, very clicky. They aren't the most powerful machines today by any means. If you just want something small that can play most arcade and consoles up to PS1 (anything beyond that is hit or miss), I think they are worth the price. Adding Batocera definitely made them more fun to play!
batocera is the best and got you covered
very nice video. thanks a lot.
Thank you Sir for all of your hard work on this project!
Excellent video. I am planning on using at least two SD cards for games. Do I have to copy the Batocera boot image to each and every SD card in order to run them? If that is the case, will the config be saved to each SD card that the boot image is on so that it will remember my settings when swapping out cards? Your advice would be really helpful as I am going to attempt installing the firmware in the next few days. Thanks.
If you plan on running games on multiple microSD cards, then yes you'd need the Batocera OS installed on each + games. I personally would use a larger card and only install to a single card. Then, once everything is exactly how you want it, make a backup of it (just incase of corruption). More details on how to backup/clone a drive can be found here, if you need it: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/
Thanks Wagner 😊
Very welcome, thank you for the $ - that was very kind of you!
@@WagnersTechTalkthankyou for the guide it is most helpful
Can't believe you replied to a comment I posted two years ago. Thanks for this video.
Does this now do safe shutdown with this new firmware?
Hey Alan, very welcome! Well, partially. You can safely shutdown by pressing Start->Quit->Shutdown to close open files, etc. But you'll still need to press the power on/off switch to totally kill power to the machine.
This video was extremely helpful. I'm hoping you could help me with a question, I am trying to find out how to open the emulation station menu inside of a game on the a12 with botacera. I just cannot find the button combination to be able to bring up the menu to access save states and such! Thank you!
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK.
Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
@@WagnersTechTalk very much so! Thank you greatly!!!
the bad thing is that you loss the Battery icon option, I watch the video hopping they fix this, but not :(
The question is which is best A12 or A13 the 13 has a slightly bigger screen 10 compared to 9, I do prefer the look of the 12...... Any thoughts?
Really up to personal preference. The A13 also has the advantage that it can fold up for easier storage.
Batocera finally got me to pull out my a13 again, I'm struggling to get pico-8 to work with the official version though, I've followed the instructions added the rasp version to bios and added the cfg file to the emulationstation but when I try load a game it just boots back into the menu.
My guess is it's missing the bios or the correct bios version. You can run the 'Missing BIOS Check' to verify. If you still have issues, you can reach out on the Batocera Discord or subreddit here: wagnerstechtalk.com/pc-batocera/#Resources . That same page has a lot of Batocera info., mostly for the PC but much of it is applicable to the A13.
it's a pretty niche system on an already rarer system so no-one seemed to know. So I just brute forced and tried a bunch of different versions, turns out the dyn version included with the raspberry pi version was all I needed to swap in place for the 32bit version@@WagnersTechTalk
Hello! I am having these issues with Batocera with the Powkiddy a12:
1. can't get a wifi dongle to work
2. can't get a external usb controller to be recognized (8-bit do xbox pro 2 wired controller)
3. HDMI out won't work
The dongle shown in this video worked for me. Perhaps it's having difficulty negotiating with your router. On my network, I have 2.4/5Ghz separated into two different SSID's. I connect to the 2.4Ghz here, perhaps something to try. I was able to get a few controllers to work in ES, but during game play they didn't function (only the internal controls). HDMI Output worked here as long as the HDMI connection was connected before powering on. After that, HDMI out worked.
Thanks for this very interesting. Am I right in saying if you put the old original stock SD card back, the A12 reverts to what it was before with its original out the box OS and games etc ...... as the OS is on the card, and there is nothing internal in the A12 that is affected ?
Very welcome and yes, that's why in this video we kept the original card safe (taped it to the back). That way, if we ever want to go back to stock, we can.
So i have installed Batocera however my screen is not allied properly, its Batocra is by defult set too a higher resolution so i have a quarter of my screen cut of in games. Any ideas has how to change the resoultion?
Should be able to go into settings and change the display resolution. If you can see the screen good, you can also power it off, then connect an HDMI cable to your TV/Monitor and power it on and should be able to see the screen to change the resolution that way. Let me know if that doesn't help, I can take a look (I've not updated in awhile).
@@WagnersTechTalk When i connect via hdmi it is the right resloution on a 1920x1080 display, However when go back to the PK i only have 1920x1080 or 640x480 or 1024x600, they are the only 3 resolution i can choose from. Thereis also and a staggering amount aspect ratio's.
Im thinking maybe i have to go to the config file loadcted on the sd card and manually set a resolution for retroarch or Batocera Ini? not sure what the Pk resolution would be though
The Flashing Bug of the Powkiddy A13 Display is fixed by Formating the Share Partition to NTFS. But before Format Copy all Folders to a Location so you can Copy it back after NTFS Format. No Flickering
Excellent information, thank you for sharing this!
So can i just swap back to my stock backed up sd card after installing Batocera? Or once Batocrea is run on the PK the stock sd card wont run the old firmware? I guess what im asking is
" is the firmware just run off the sd card so i can swap form batocrea to original just by swapping cards:"
Sure, in this video I show to keep your original microSD safe. You just power it off, swap the cards and it's back the way it was.
@@WagnersTechTalk thanks for the speedy reply good too know that i can swap back and forth.
hi ! good video ! hmn... is it possible to use the HDMI port and USB controls with the batocera system installed?
If the HDMI cable is connected before power-on, it will work for the display. However, USB controls weren't working for me.
Whenever i tried to enter the retroarch menu, the game would quit and return to the emulation station. It doesn't happen in V33, but after I update to V35 (then V39), I can't enter the retroarch menu anymore. Any solution?
I've not updated Batocera on the PK's since this video, I'm not sure at this point.
Thank you for your response
Its appeared that because the hotkey button to the return button. I simply just need to reassign it to select button and the the problem solved.
@@MrSoftypolimer How did you adjust the hotkey??
Hi love the vid. I am hoping someone can help me though. I have installed batacero on my a12 and added rom however nothing displays properly right from boot up the screen us stretch and in game the screen is stretched so I do not see the full image tried every different res and aspect ratio and does not solve the problem please help
Try setting the emulator to core provided, that should help.
Yea I have already tried and it did not make a difference
Does the batocera download already come with the BIOS of systems preinstalled or do i have to download them?
You'll need to download bios and roms separately.
@WagnersTechTalk I appreciate the reply, keep up the good content 🙏
I installed it on my A13, the only issue is that theres no hotkey for opening retroarch menu during game play, the back button on the A13 exits the game back to the home screen, do you know of any reaolution to this?
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK.
Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
@@WagnersTechTalk you are the man Wagner!!! That was absolutely what I've been looking for!!! All hail king Wagner!!
@@jq8166 lol, so happy it helped!
Hi Wagner, did you manage to fix the screen of your A13.. as mine started to develop the screen flicking issue too..
I have not, it's on my todo list but I've been tied up on other projects and haven't investigated. If you figure something out before I do, let me know please 😎
For mine, I will have screen freezes when I change games. At this point I would need to just switch the unit off and back on again. I have used two different branded legit SD cards, it seems to be the same.
Could it be my A12 hardware itself? Heated up or faulty sd card slot?
It seems to depend on the type of games you play. I mostly use it for playing Arcade (MAME) games and it works well. If it freezes up, it's likely that the game(s) you're trying to play may require more hardware resources than are available with the device.
Kind of a last ditch effort asking here, but having issues getting games/emulators to recognize a second controller on batocera... It reads it fine in the main menu navigation screen (I can even navigate screen with a second controller) however when I enter a game/emulator it completely stops reading it... tried to map it via quick menu in game, doesnt register face buttons...
Tried asking reddit no luck. Sorry to ask in chat but have no idea what to do
In this build on the A12/13 I ran into the same thing when trying an external controller. It would work fine while in the menu, but once in a game it wouldn't recognize the external controller. Pretty sure we're not both wrong, may need a future update from the Batocera team for this. You may want to check their Discord (links here wagnerstechtalk.com/pc-batocera/#Resources ) and see if there is a work-around. If you find one, let me know please. I didn't dig into this issue as I only had one other person asking about it.
@@WagnersTechTalk sweet I'll try the discord, thanks
@@WagnersTechTalk yea sorry tried discord didn't seem to get a response, there is a v39 otw so heres hoping they resolve it
I have 2 powkiddy A12s one for me and one for my son, when I put a micro SD with Batocera on my son's it doesn't appear centered and the resolution is wrong. Can you help me change the screen resolution?
go into SYSTEM SETTINGS -> VIDEO OUTPUT and make sure it's set for AUTO. Then go into USER INTERFACE MODE and make sure it's set for FULL. That should be it. Worst-case, if not you can clone your microSD to his microSD. It will take more time to do, but here's how to do it if you want to: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/#Backup_Clone_a_Drive . You can likely skip the 'Expand a partition' option, if the cards are both the same size.
Can you plug in a USB flash drive or external HDD with roms and press F1 to copy from that drive, like you can with Batocera on a PC?
No, unfortunately I tried that first and the File Manager isn't available in the PK build.
Ive gotten everything installed, do you know whats the hotkey to save state and load state for psx as an example? or have you remapped the controls
You can re-map the buttons by pressing the START button, move to 'Controller & BT Settings' -> 'Controller Mapping' then press+hold a button. Map A/B/X/Y/START/SELECT/UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT then (L1 & L2 to the blue buttons). Press+hold a button to skip over the Analog, L2/R2/L3/R3. For the Hotkey, press SELECT, then OK.
Then go into a game/emulator (i.e. Playstation for example). You can press SELECT+B to enter RetroArch. SELECT+X to load a save state. SELECT+Y to save the current game state. The back (sideways U button with an arrow), will still allow exiting a game. Hope that helps!
Tried this on my a13, but mine won't start/black screen only.
I am currently trying to find ways on how to fix my a13.
The day I got it, after a few games, the TF card, like, imploaded and all games are gone.
If you have save files for the stock TF card files, may I kindly ask for a download link please?
BTW, my a13 version is ver1.3 zx 230110
edit: tried writing instead of flashing, worked.
now my only issue is, IP address shows, but internet not connected.
Happy you got it! For the internet, back out/in a few times (or more) to see if the status changed. Sometimes it takes time to register and doesn't update the UI that internet is available. That part is a little wonky.
@@WagnersTechTalk internet now connects. Prob is, I can't access batocera in the network. So i used free trial of linux fs.
Also, why can't it connect to HD TV?? It has an option to switch screens once you plug the hd cable, but its not working.
@@clariceedward27 I mention that in this video. Make sure you power off the machine first, connect the HDMI to the back of the machine and power it on. Then you can set the video output.
Today I went to pick up my powkiddy on the 13th and saw that my micro SD no longer works, would anyone have the image or the original factory Chinese system to install:?
Can Batocera be downoaded on sd card using a Chromebook ?
I'm honestly not sure, I don't own a Chromebook.
Hi John, quick question. Does it have to be a 128gb sd card in order for it to work? I have a 64gb sd card and it can't seem to find it on balena etcher.
It can be any capacity microSD card. Give Pi Imager a try (here's how: wagnerstechtalk.com/common/#Burn_an_Image_with_Raspberry_Pi_Imager ). I prefer Pi Imager for a lot of things and it's useful for more than using it with a Raspberry Pi.
@@WagnersTechTalk Wow, you're right, Raspberry Pi Imager is so much better and I was able to successfully write and install Batocera into my Powkiddy A13! You're the best, John. Thank you so much for helping us fellow gamers. =]
@@GenesisRockwell Very welcome, happy to hear that helped!
Awesome video! Any news links to the A13? Looking to find the lowest price shipped to the US
Thank you! They are getting a bit harder to find, Aliexpress may still be a good option.
@@WagnersTechTalk ordered from there yesterday!
Hello does the functions of the original system still work sutch as hdmi i heard with some other custom system that it dosent also do linux ports work im going to put open beats of rage on there
In this update, you have to have the HDMI cable connected before powering on the PK device. If you do, then it will utilize the external HDMI connection. However, if you just plug it in once powered-on, it won't show up on the external HDMI display. Hope that helps!
I just installed batocera on the a13, but I can't seem to get mega drive to have a custom controller configuration. It seems to lock the arcade buttons on 3 of the same button. Do you know how to set it up?
Where do i put my bios files? eg.psx bios. Just straight into bios folder?
Yep, just copy scph5500.bin (JP), scph5501.bin (US) or scph5502.bin (EU) to the /bios subfolder.
can i use it as pc joystick for steam games?
Unfortunately, no.
hello! mr.Wagner's Techtalk
I have a question.I have an A12 dev.D.
I'm using BOB Batocera36 BOB latest version at the moment.
But Dreamcast and PSP Unstable, freezes a lot
I searched the net and found I found a test version called Batocera38 for A13
but I don't know if it's supported compatible with A12 /dev.D.
Do you know of a Batocera38 for A12 /dev D?
This model comes in many monitor sizes.
Would it have to be optimized to use it Batocera 38?
The version on the Batocera page is the same as was shown here, v35 (older build). Dreamcast and some PSP won't run well on that CPU, remember it only has 512MB of RAM so larger games, graphically intensive games, etc. aren't going to run well or at all. What will run well are older consoles and arcade games (most of them). There isn't currently a Batocera v38 build for the A12/13. If you hover your mouse over the download link, you'll see in the filename it's v35.
@@WagnersTechTalk
Thanks for getting back to me.
Here are the results of my test
Conditions1（Needs to be charging.）
Conditions2（ reboot and only run one game)
PSP：CSO files Most games frame rate skipping will stabilize
DC: If you set it to CHD files Even with a 1GB game files does not freeze
(GDI CDI ALL freeze)
If you run and change many games easy freezing increases.
A friend gave me what it seems to be a clone of powkiddy. Its a "Games Power" and it seems to have a rockchip rk312x with a ARMv7 Processor rev5 (v7l). It's Android system it seems? Does anyone know if batocera runs here? I flashed one Batocera v38 to a microSd but it doesnt boot in this "Games Power" machine.
I don't have that device, I can't offer any suggestions. Perhaps someone else here can assist.
@@WagnersTechTalk does that powkiddy is android based too?
I don't think the powkiddy A12/13 is running Android, no. More like it's own custom internal image.
@@WagnersTechTalk o wonder how can I change this OS in this PowKiddy clone (“Games Power”). If someone reading this know, let me know please!
@@WagnersTechTalk i like this system this clone brings.. i just could trade the ppsspp emulator for a psx rearmed. The psp games run very bad but psx would run like a charm. I notice (when I plug a keyboard and mouse) that it is running a android software, the emulators are: vnes, vsfc, vgb, vgba, mame, ppspp, vgen, vgbc.
For the life of me I can’t find an English video on how to put batocera onto a powkiddy x2 or ps7000, does anyone have any links or tips?
Sorry, I don't own either device here.
Thanks. But I can't use the 2 usb gamepad. Is there a solution for that, pls?
I'll check it out, but I'm pretty sure I got one of my gamepads working on it (though, it is an obscure NES-style game pad I tested). I'll get back to you.
I have good news and bad news. I was only partially correct. I could map the controller (tried a clone xbox360 and a nes-style gamepad), and could navigate Emulation Station just fine. However after launching a game (Galaga), the controller wouldn't respond, even after setting P1/P2 specifically to the connected controller. I'm not sure if there is a solution for this, I'll mention it to the Batocera devs but can't guarantee a fix/solution.
@@WagnersTechTalk Thanks for replying me.
Does this work on updated versions of A13?
I only have the one unit for testing, not sure what's different honestly.
Hey john I’m having issues setting up my retro pie I have watch your videos and am still struggling would you be able to help?
Not sure what issue you're having, but please see this portion of the guide for RetroPie: wagnerstechtalk.com/rpi4gaming/#Official_RetroPie . If that doesn't help, please let me know the issue you're having.
Thank you for this tutorial. I have everything up and running except for Sega Genesis games. I've tried everything, including changing emulators. Do you have any suggestions?
Don't recall if I tested Sega Genesis games, honestly. I was primarily interested in Arcade games myself. But did test some others. One thing that may be worth trying is check what file types are supported by the emulator (see the .txt file in the folder) and make sure the files you're copying are supported file types. That's all I can think of. If that doesn't help, reach out to the Batocera subreddit and you may get a better answer: www.reddit.com/r/batocera/
Okay. Thank you, sir.@@WagnersTechTalk
How can i add images to my gamelists?
A couple of ways, you can copy them manually to the microSD card using DiskGenius (not free), use a linux machine to copy the files or if you have the WiFi adapter mentioned you can scrape the artwork that way.
@@WagnersTechTalk thanks man I used screen scraper in conjunction with Linux filesystem for windows . You Rock
@@WagnersTechTalk Do you know where we put the images? I'd like to manually add some images for MAME games, but I don't know where to put them on the SD card. Thanks in advance!
How can see battery level?
There doesn't appear to be a setting for that.
do you have the factory files of powkiddy a13?I lost it,I really need it
I can't provide bios or rom files, they're (c) material. You can try Powkiddy to see if they can help.
One more quick question, I am seeing other USB Dongles that are plug and play with 5GHZ network. Will any of those work? Not a huge deal if not but the 2.4 network speed is probably why the roms were so slow to copy
I can't answer that honestly. I only found the one that worked for me (I only had about 3 I could test). Even with that one, it's not great but usable.
@@WagnersTechTalk cool, was just wondering... Amazon has an easy return policy so will try a few for the 5 GHZ network and report back