Hi forum. I'm looking to do a small project adding WiFi music player capabilities to a basic, small (but nice looking!) bluetooth speaker.
The speaker is very simple: one knob to turn it on and control the volume, then you search for it via Bluetooth and connect. It has a microSD slot and a USB input to play music from a memory card/stick but I've never used them.
My aim is to ADD the ability to play my WiFi music library through the speaker, but also KEEP the existing bluetooth functionality so anyone can directly connect their phone as well.
Going to use a Pi zero W/zero 2 hidden inside the housing. I will have minimal access to the pi once it's set up, mostly using my media library app to control playback, however I'm open to the possibility of a few external controls such as a power button and a source selector switch. I might even try to integrate this HAT which includes a small screen and 4 buttons, although that might be v2.0!
The main thing that is giving me a headache is I'm not sure how best to interconnect the pi and the existing speaker hardware to keep all the functionality and make it as simple to use as possible.
I think I have 4 possible options (but other suggestions very welcome!):
Options 1
Leave bluetooth speaker fully intact, connect pi via bluetooth. This has the advantage that I wouldn't need a DAC on the Pi and wouldn't need to do much rewiring. Of course the sound quality wouldn't be great due to BT compression, but given that it's just a small Bluetooth speaker anyway, that's not a dealbreaker.
My main question with this method is how I could easily switch the Bluetooth source from Pi to phone and back? I would have minimal access to the pi once it's inside the housing, so would need a way to switch the Pi BT on/off externally AND for it to default to the speaker without any prompting. Ideally a 1-press solution to toggle it.
Option 2
Leave bluetooth speaker intact, wire the pi to the existing speakers in parallel using a DAC hat and speaker output. Would be much better sound quality and no problem with BT connection not connecting/hanging/needing management.
The question here is how to control the volume of the Pi, as I assume the volume knob would only control the amplitude of the Bluetooth input. There is also the issue of the speaker auto connecting to a paired phone as soon as it's switched on, although maybe that's not a huge problem?
Option 3
Leave bluetooth speaker intact, somehow connect pi to the other inputs of the BT system. The idea would be to simply plug the pi in and let the speaker's built in source switching do the work. If it had an AUX input that would be super simple, but it only has a MicroSD slot and a USB input. I doubt the Bluetooth speaker would appear as an external soundcard if I just plugged it in to the pi USB bus, so I guess I'd need to do something clever with delivering a digital stream through USB that the speaker could understand. No clue how to do that!
Option 4
Rip all the existing bluetooth circuits out of the speaker, leaving only the speakers and the on/volume knob. Replace it with the pi and configure it to be both a WiFi media player AND a Bluetooth receiver, which would replicate the existing functionality.
Although it seems like the most work, I'm thinking this might actually be the tidiest way to go, as I wouldn't have to try and bridge two conflicting systems. I can see it should be possible to make this work through the coding and config of the pi alone.
However there is still the issue of how to switch between media player mode and Bluetooth mode with limited physical access to the Pi. A simple slide switch on the side of the unit would be ideal, but how to wire that into the pi? Also, could the volume knob still be used to turn the whole setup on AND control the volume? The other potential downside is how long would the pi take to boot up and be available for pairing in Bluetooth mode? At the moment you can turn the speaker on and pair with it in about 10 secs. I wouldn't want it to take much longer through the pi, as the whole point is quick convenience. Is there also an issue with security, allowing people to pair with the pi?
I would really appreciate any help with this. I'm not new to using a ready made pi (the media server I want to connect to is a Pi 4), but this is my first build/retrofit project. It seemed a simple enough task to start with, but I think I've bitten off more than I can chew!
Thanks.
The speaker is very simple: one knob to turn it on and control the volume, then you search for it via Bluetooth and connect. It has a microSD slot and a USB input to play music from a memory card/stick but I've never used them.
My aim is to ADD the ability to play my WiFi music library through the speaker, but also KEEP the existing bluetooth functionality so anyone can directly connect their phone as well.
Going to use a Pi zero W/zero 2 hidden inside the housing. I will have minimal access to the pi once it's set up, mostly using my media library app to control playback, however I'm open to the possibility of a few external controls such as a power button and a source selector switch. I might even try to integrate this HAT which includes a small screen and 4 buttons, although that might be v2.0!
The main thing that is giving me a headache is I'm not sure how best to interconnect the pi and the existing speaker hardware to keep all the functionality and make it as simple to use as possible.
I think I have 4 possible options (but other suggestions very welcome!):
Options 1
Leave bluetooth speaker fully intact, connect pi via bluetooth. This has the advantage that I wouldn't need a DAC on the Pi and wouldn't need to do much rewiring. Of course the sound quality wouldn't be great due to BT compression, but given that it's just a small Bluetooth speaker anyway, that's not a dealbreaker.
My main question with this method is how I could easily switch the Bluetooth source from Pi to phone and back? I would have minimal access to the pi once it's inside the housing, so would need a way to switch the Pi BT on/off externally AND for it to default to the speaker without any prompting. Ideally a 1-press solution to toggle it.
Option 2
Leave bluetooth speaker intact, wire the pi to the existing speakers in parallel using a DAC hat and speaker output. Would be much better sound quality and no problem with BT connection not connecting/hanging/needing management.
The question here is how to control the volume of the Pi, as I assume the volume knob would only control the amplitude of the Bluetooth input. There is also the issue of the speaker auto connecting to a paired phone as soon as it's switched on, although maybe that's not a huge problem?
Option 3
Leave bluetooth speaker intact, somehow connect pi to the other inputs of the BT system. The idea would be to simply plug the pi in and let the speaker's built in source switching do the work. If it had an AUX input that would be super simple, but it only has a MicroSD slot and a USB input. I doubt the Bluetooth speaker would appear as an external soundcard if I just plugged it in to the pi USB bus, so I guess I'd need to do something clever with delivering a digital stream through USB that the speaker could understand. No clue how to do that!
Option 4
Rip all the existing bluetooth circuits out of the speaker, leaving only the speakers and the on/volume knob. Replace it with the pi and configure it to be both a WiFi media player AND a Bluetooth receiver, which would replicate the existing functionality.
Although it seems like the most work, I'm thinking this might actually be the tidiest way to go, as I wouldn't have to try and bridge two conflicting systems. I can see it should be possible to make this work through the coding and config of the pi alone.
However there is still the issue of how to switch between media player mode and Bluetooth mode with limited physical access to the Pi. A simple slide switch on the side of the unit would be ideal, but how to wire that into the pi? Also, could the volume knob still be used to turn the whole setup on AND control the volume? The other potential downside is how long would the pi take to boot up and be available for pairing in Bluetooth mode? At the moment you can turn the speaker on and pair with it in about 10 secs. I wouldn't want it to take much longer through the pi, as the whole point is quick convenience. Is there also an issue with security, allowing people to pair with the pi?
I would really appreciate any help with this. I'm not new to using a ready made pi (the media server I want to connect to is a Pi 4), but this is my first build/retrofit project. It seemed a simple enough task to start with, but I think I've bitten off more than I can chew!
Thanks.
Statistics: Posted by sparcymarc — Wed Feb 04, 2026 10:25 pm