Have you tried to see if the cable is working - on another device ? Are you using a proper power source for your Pi ?
Unfortunately without a keyboard or without using SSH is going to be difficult to diagnose this. Is your Pi Zero the W model, with WiFi ?

@Guto-Du it's a possibility it's defective. Try over volting the pi (without over clocking) to see if it's more stable. If it is then your pi isn't stable at factory settings and should be sent back for replacement. I have seen multiple reports of pi zero's not stable at factory clock speeds. I think the quality control on the pi zero might be slightly less than other models. Probably because it's a $5 computer.

so its official, i'm quiting this build.
looking forward to future projects and hoping a pi zero 2 will come along.
i just wanted to take the time to thank everyone here for the effort to make all these projects possible for us, you are doing a great job and i am very greatfull for that.
already have a pi4 at at hand with 4gb and waiting for dreamcast emulation as i see the promising flycast core inplimentation,thats my all time favorite console looking to be very well emulated.
so big thanks to all and let me know if i can donate without paypal, cause i really don't like paypal.

@mitu Just a quick update. I compared the .bin/.cue files on my pi to the database. It turned out, that half of the .bin file was corrupted so I just had to put them again on my Pi0. And now MGS runs pretty well. Thanks for the help! :)

I got the non-libretro version working for pi zero (Retroflag Gpi case) and wrote up a guide in case it helps anyone interested in Cannonball on Pi zero: https://sinisterspatula.github.io/SuperRetropieGuides/cannonball and also, if it helps retropie dev's in adding a pi zero specific version, my modified repository that worked for zero is located here: https://github.com/SinisterSpatula/cannonball

@zuendy do you have the files an a other webside too ? thingiverse show a fail when i want tzo download. THX for you development !

@mitu said in Speeding up retropie boot up on a Pi zero and turning off BT & WiFi..:

@MachLid One thing you can do to speed up the boot is to disable file shares (Samba services). From what I've noticed, this is one of the services that takes up a lot of time (proportional to the total boot time) to start up.
I've looked up in the RetroPie-Setup script and you only have the options to remove Samba completely (not disable it), so you'd have to use the command line to disable the services manually.

sudo systemctl disable smbd sudo systemctl disable nmbd

More ideas and help!! thank you very much, and I'm also going to try this as well.
I have no problem killing anything unnecessary on it in order to speed up booting into the game selection menu.
What I'm hoping to do with this Pi Zero is simply and only use it for mostly Atari 2600 stuff and maybe some popular arcade games from pre 1990's or earlier (if it'll handle it).
I grew up with a Atari 2600 and lots of this stuff thru out the 1980s,, and thought it'd be neat to have something very little and compact (and even battery powered) and be able to quickly power on, and play some of the true classics. Not sure what I'm doing yet for a compact and portable housing or anything like that yet,, I just wanted to square away the working parts first.

Thanks again.

@VictimRLSH not really enough CPU power, but it has enough GPU power - http://www.raspberrypi.com/mpeg-2-license-key/

then Kodi can play back DVD with hardware acceleration.

Have a small update. I have verified that HDMI output works. Something is going on with how the LCD screen on my Freeplay Zero handles the resolution of the emulator. I wanted to see if I could change it in the emulator, but there are no options for resolution. :/

I had a bit of the same issue.
If i understand correctly, then when you press the "escape" key on keyboard the menu pops up.
What i did, i assigned in the controller setup a unused key, like the right thumbs key for example. I used the LR3 button to let it assign. In my case it made the "LR3 \XAC" key.
I saved the setting to global.
edited the file " /opt/retropie/configs/psx/pcsx/pcsc.cfg"
Changed the line "bind \xAC = LR3" to "bind \xAC = Enter Menu"
Saved file restart game. Then pressing the Right thumb opened the menu.

@r4l

Hey bud. Don't know if you saw it or not, but figured I'd send you the link to the SNES compatibility list for the Pi Zero. :)

https://retropie.org.uk/forum/post/158554

Cheers.

@tuki_cat The only problem was that 33% of times it failed to boot a game. I can’t understand why it’s impossible now to run any game at decent speed. Everything is 2x too slow.

@mitu I made it! I have deleted whole scummvm folder, rebooted and the ES finallt works!

Thank you everyone. The problem is officially solved.

Yup, I’ve just reinstalled previous emulator. Now it doesn’t work. The emu itself is up, but games won’t boot.

I also noticed that I’ve been using uae4all this whole time. I was convinced it had been uae4arm. Anyway, all worked in most cases, arm and berry don’t. But now all doesn’t as well.

Please excuse my mistakes. I’m aware they’re silly, but I’m a bit lost.

i'm afraid I cant find much on how to output to this from python. Im no coder, it needs to be call-able from python once Ive done with my process.

thanks for info!.. do you have any more?

Other options please! what other options do I have to get my character input into ES and retroarch please?

@buzz I know it works via the wifikey file, but in this case there was no controller or keyboard working and I was referring to the next section (Connecting to Wifi Without a Keyboard (Raspbian Stretch)) where it's possible to configure wifi directly via the wpa_supplicant.conffile on the /boot partition

@mitu thank you, appreciate the insight

@steve-bamford yes, sorry my response was a bit quick! I must have skimmed over your question. It's good to see others using xroar. I use it to play the 5 games I had on the Tandy 30-odd years ago.