Question How can I power and charge a Raspberry Pi 5 simultaneously with a battery?

[Tech Flare]

Hello all,

I am working on making a portable retro console using a Raspberry Pi 5 that fits inside a Wii U GamePad shell. The problem is, the Raspberry Pi 5 is very hard to power due to its 5v/5a requirements.

So, here's what I have so far:

• The Pi will power both the 7" LCD display and Teensy for the controller.
• The Pi will be powered by this Pi5 power supply board
  

That's where I come to my question. I can power the Pi with this setup, but I cannot charge the battery. I used this board for my Pi 4 project, but, unfortunately, it doesn't support the Pi 5. Does anyone know of any similar boards that could provide power and simultaneous charging for the Pi 5?

Also, I am trying to find the smallest possible battery for this project. If you have any ideas, please let me know. I haven't had any luck because the power supply board requires at least 6v, and I'll need about 6,000 mAh to get one hour of battery life (lmk if that calculation is incorrect, but I think it's right).

Any help is appreciated. Thanks!

 

[Jonny]

Pi 5's don't actually consume the full 5a the whole time. Power supplies generally include a fair bit of overhead in terms of their current supply.
Just doing some brief googling, the pi 5 uses up to 7 watts under high stress and around 2.4 watts at idle. The overhead from the power supply is meant to be able to provide compliant power to all peripherals from the same power supply. You should be just fine with the pi 4 power supply if you don't plan on connecting any high power peripherals.

Taking a peek at the retroPSU product page, it looks like it has 2 separate 5V 3A channels. I would recommend using one for your Pi alone and the other for all the peripherals in your build.

In terms of fitting batteries, a few 18650s/22650s should be more than enough. If you're planning on using lipo cells, use your best judgement, but I personally like 18650s.

Also just a heads up, the Wii U screen is 6.2 inches, so you'll probably have to modify your case to be able to fit in a 7 inch screen.

 

[Tech Flare]

Pi 5's don't actually consume the full 5a the whole time. Power supplies generally include a fair bit of overhead in terms of their current supply.
Just doing some brief googling, the pi 5 uses up to 7 watts under high stress and around 2.4 watts at idle. The overhead from the power supply is meant to be able to provide compliant power to all peripherals from the same power supply. You should be just fine with the pi 4 power supply if you don't plan on connecting any high power peripherals.

Taking a peek at the retroPSU product page, it looks like it has 2 separate 5V 3A channels. I would recommend using one for your Pi alone and the other for all the peripherals in your build.

In terms of fitting batteries, a few 18650s/22650s should be more than enough. If you're planning on using lipo cells, use your best judgement, but I personally like 18650s.

Also just a heads up, the Wii U screen is 6.2 inches, so you'll probably have to modify your case to be able to fit in a 7 inch screen.

That's a great point. I'll test it out with the RetroPSU and report back. I'll probably go with lipo batteries as they aren't as tall and will probably fit easier.

 

[Tech Flare]

Update - it worked! Thanks for the help @Jonny