I’ve been using Raspberry Pis since their first release for various purposes (I still have all of them, and they still work with the latest OS even after a decade).
Since 2014, I’ve been using them as a home entertainment system. In 2022, I’m using a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 4 GB and LibreELEC as the operating system, and this post is all about showing how to set up your own home entertainment system with this hardware and software.
Hardware Requirements
- Raspberry Pi 4 (2GB should work, but 4GB+ recommended)
- microSD card (4GB and above)
- HDMI cable (HDMI to Micro HDMI or a regular HDMI cable and a Micro HDMI to HDMI Adapter) CableTV or monitor (with a built-in speaker or an audio port to connect to an external speaker)
- Raspberry Pi USB-C power adapter
- Remote control or keyboard/mouse
- (Optional) Raspberry Pi case with cooling
- (Optional) Ethernet cable
Software Requirements
Installation
Step 1: Download the latest LibreELEC release for Raspberry Pi
Go to the LibreELEC Raspberry Pi page and download the latest release
Step 2: Extract the compressed archive
The downloaded file is a compressed archive. Extract the img file inside this by double-clicking on macOS. On Windows, you will need an external tool such as 7-zip.
Step 3: Run balenaEtcher
Click Flash from file
Navigate to the LibreELEC image and click Open.
Click Select target, select your microSD card and click the Select button.
Finally, click the Flash! button.
The flashing process shouldn’t take too long (it depends on the size of the card and your computer performance)
Wait until you see the successful completion
Now you can remove the microSD card from your computer.
Step 4: Insert everything into Raspberry Pi and power it on.
Make sure you’ve plugged in
- microSD card
- HDMI cable
- Remote control or keyboard
As listed on the hardware requirements, you should have a Micro HDMI to HDMI cable or an adapter:
I use a DroiX remote control:
Step 5: Configure Kodi
You should now see LibreELEC booting and resizing the SD card.
Wait until it reboots and comes back to the configuration screen.
A remote control is great for day-to-day use with Kodi, but for the initial setup, I’d recommend having a keyboard plugged in for faster typing.
Select your language and click Next.
On the next screen, focus on the hostname and press enter.
Give it a unique name so you can later identify it in your network.
Select your network. I used a wired network for simplicity and performance. If you are using WiFi, select your network and enter your passphrase.
Accept the default for SSH and Samba settings. They are not needed to consume shared content. It’s a good practice to keep these settings off if you are not going to use them for security purposes.
You should see the message for completion
Click the Next button to close the window, and now you have a working Kodi on your Raspberry Pi 4.
Conclusion
In this article, you learned how to install Kodi on Raspberry Pi 4.
You can now test your installation by plugging in a USB with some media on it. Also, you might want to backup your microSD card to an image file. This way, if your microSD card gets corrupted, you can flash your image to a new one and carry on without having to install it from scratch.
You will most likely want to access some shared content by a NAS or a file server over the network. There will be more articles about Kodi and its use as a media centre and home entertainment system. Stay tuned and enjoy your Kodi! See you at the next one!
