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PrestoDeck: How Fatih Ak Turned Pimoroni Presto Into a Spotify Controller

PrestoDeck turns Pimoroni Presto into a touchscreen Spotify controller with album art, track details, and playback controls. Here’s what setup requires and what limitations to expect.
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PrestoDeck is Fatih Ak’s MicroPython project that turns Pimoroni’s Presto touchscreen into a Spotify controller: it displays album art and track details, and lets you control playback with touch. Building it requires a Presto, a Spotify developer app, Wi-Fi credentials, Thonny, and a USB-C connection to install the files.

What PrestoDeck does

PrestoDeck uses Spotify’s Web API to show the currently playing track’s album cover, name, and artist on Presto’s screen. Its touch interface offers controls for skipping tracks, play/pause, shuffle, and repeat. It polls Spotify for playback information and sends control commands back through the API.

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The result is a dedicated, square-screen controller rather than a general-purpose Spotify app. The project is intended for Pimoroni Presto and is written in MicroPython.

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Hardware and software you need

  • Pimoroni Presto: the required display and controller board. Pimoroni specifies an RP2350B processor, a 4-inch 480 × 480 capacitive touchscreen, 16 MB QSPI flash, 8 MB PSRAM, RM2 wireless connectivity for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, seven SK6812-compatible RGB LEDs, USB-C, microSD, a piezo speaker, a battery connector, and a pre-installed black anodised aluminium stand. The board ships assembled and supports MicroPython or C/C++.
  • Computer and Thonny: the project’s documented setup uses Thonny to select a MicroPython interpreter and transfer files.
  • Wi-Fi: credentials are added to the project’s secrets.py file.
  • Spotify developer app: you will enter its client ID and client secret to generate the credentials used by the project.
  • USB-C cable: used to connect Presto to the computer for file transfer. The README lists a right-angle USB-C cable as optional, not required.

Set up PrestoDeck

  1. Install Thonny on your computer.
  2. Clone the project: download or clone the PrestoDeck repository.
  3. Create a Spotify developer app: in its settings, set the redirect URI to http://127.0.0.1:8080 and enable the Web API.
  4. Generate Spotify credentials: from the project directory, run bash adhoc/generate_token.sh. Enter the app’s client ID, client secret, and redirect URI when prompted; authorize in the browser, then select a default Spotify device.
  5. Connect Presto over USB-C and open the project in Thonny. Select the MicroPython (Raspberry Pi Pico) interpreter, then upload the project files to the board.
  6. Configure Wi-Fi and Spotify: add your Wi-Fi credentials and the generated SPOTIFY_CREDENTIALS={...} line to secrets.py.
  7. Start the interface by running main.py.

The setup depends on the Spotify app authorization and on choosing a default Spotify device during token generation. If the controller does not reach the intended playback device, revisit that device-selection step and confirm the credentials and Wi-Fi details in secrets.py.

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Hosyond 7 Inch Touchscreen IPS DSI Display Compatible with Raspberry Pi 5/4/3, 800x480 Pixel Capacitive Screen MIPI Driver-Free Interface
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Known limitations

Quick taps can be missed

Fatih Ak told Hackster that frequent Spotify API calls can mean quick screen taps are sometimes missed. If an action does not register, tap again with a deliberate press rather than assuming every brief touch will be captured.

Some characters disappear from track details

Ak also said the graphics library does not support non-ASCII characters, so PrestoDeck strips those characters from track and artist names. This can affect accented letters and other characters used in international catalogs; it is a display limitation, not a change to the Spotify track itself.

Rank #2
Hosyond 5 Inch Touchscreen IPS MIPI DSI Display Compatible with Raspberry Pi 5/4/3, 800x480 Pixel Capacitive Screen Driver-Free Interface
  • 5-inch 800*480 resolution capacitive touch screen, IPS type, good viewing angle.
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  • As a touchscreen monitor, compatible with Raspberry Pi 5 / 4B / 3B+ / 3B / 3A+ / 2B / 1B+ / 1A+. (No HDMI. Not compatible with any other devices.)
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  • Easy to use -> No configuration required (for new and configuration unchanged systems). Provide detailed usage documentation.
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Support and firmware context

Pimoroni’s firmware repository lists PrestoDeck as a community resource, but says community examples have not been written or tested by Pimoroni and are unsupported by the company. The project should therefore be treated as a community build, not an official Pimoroni Spotify product.

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Pimoroni separately documents installing Presto UF2 firmware through bootloader mode and Thonny. That is ecosystem firmware guidance; the PrestoDeck project’s own documented workflow is to select the MicroPython interpreter in Thonny and upload its files.

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