The latest Raspberry Pi Bullseye release is new and may have issues with the PiTFT. In that case, you can try the previous buster release.

Bullseye Desktop Version Breaking Changes

Raspberry Pi recently release a new major version of Raspberry Pi OS called Bullseye. In our testing the desktop version, which is the default installation with the Raspberry Pi imager, it may not work.

The last known for-sure tested-and-working version is May 28, 2021 (https://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspios_armhf/images/raspios_armhf-2021-05-28/) from https://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspios_armhf/images/.

We have applied a fix, but it hasn't been thoroughly tested. Please let us know if you are having issues and you can use the previous release in the meantime.

Static Issue

The Raspberry Pi Kernel sometimes updates firmware, which can which can break the Frame Buffer Copy mechanism. In this particular case, it only seems to affect the Raspberry Pi 4. The issue appears as a garbled screen that looks like static.

adafruit_products_104066864-b9a6f300-51c7-11eb-94c7-3a87cc07fe5b.png

To check your kernel version, run the following command:

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dpkg -l raspberrypi-kernel

dpkg -l raspberrypi-kernel

You should see output similar to the following. If the kernel version is later than 1:1.20210527, then the following fix should work.

adafruit_products_Screen_Shot_2021-09-08_at_2.43.27_PM.png

We have a script that is able to set the kernel version to the kernel version prior to it breaking. To "pin" the kernel version to an older version prior to it breaking, you'll need to run a few commands. You can either SSH into the Pi or hook up an HDMI cable, though the display may appear small.

Once you'd at a command prompt, run the following commands. Note that the 1: prefix in the version number is on purpose because of the way that pinning was recently changed.

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cd ~
sudo pip3 install --upgrade adafruit-python-shell
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/adafruit/Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts/main/rpi_pin_kernel_firmware.py
sudo python3 rpi_pin_kernel_firmware.py 1:1.20210527-1

cd ~
sudo pip3 install --upgrade adafruit-python-shell
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/adafruit/Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts/main/rpi_pin_kernel_firmware.py
sudo python3 rpi_pin_kernel_firmware.py 1:1.20210527-1

After it finishes, reboot the Pi.

Once the Pi is back up, the display may appear inverted. To fix this, just run the Adafruit PiTFT script again and reboot a second time.

You can check the new kernel version by running the dpkg command again:

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dpkg -l raspberrypi-kernel

dpkg -l raspberrypi-kernel

This time, your version should be 1:1.20210527-1.

adafruit_products_Screen_Shot_2021-09-08_at_2.51.15_PM.png

BrainCraft Audio Driver Reinstall

If your display is a BrainCraft HAT and you have pinned your kernel, you should be running a kernel version of around 5.10. You can check this by typing uname -r.

adafruit_products_Screen_Shot_2021-09-08_at_2.52.07_PM.png

If you pinned to an older version that uses a kernel of 5.4, you may need to reinstall the audio drivers at this point to get sound working. Be sure to follow the BrainCraft HAT Audio Setup instructions for a kernel version around 5.4 when reinstalling.