Hello everyone,
I’m in the process of transforming an outdated FM tuner into a streamer, but I’ve encountered a problem with the available space for my Raspberry Pi 3, Iqaudio DAC, and jumper cables. They are slightly too tall. Since I’m using nearly all of the GPIO pins on the Pi for my project, I’m uncertain if there is a way to connect my DAC differently, perhaps by placing it beside the Pi. Space constraints are a concern, so I would be grateful for any suggestions or advice you may have.
I’ve got one of these on the way.
You can also use a 40 pin M to F ribbon cable (check the end connections are correct and make sure to plug it in the correct way round pin for pin, they are not keyed) between the pi header and any hat card header, I used one in order to fit my pi4 in a passively cooled case which would not also fit a hat, and then made a 3d printed case for my dac with the cable running between.
Try to keep the length of the cable to the minimum required and avoid crossing other wires if possible, but 20cm long is fine in my application, more is probably OK, makes no difference in operation. If you know the pinouts you can also just wire pin to pin directly only where needed.
You still have the problem of physically fixing the hat somehow, but a few screws might work, or maybe a 3d printed mount for pi and hat if you want to be fancy.