How to Start

From a bare Jetson Nano to live EEG in your browser, in eight steps.

Gather the parts

You need the JNEEG, a Jetson Nano, a 5 V / 3 A power bank, 8 electrodes with two ear clips, and a cap. See What's in the Box.

Prepare the Jetson Nano

Flash NVIDIA's JetPack image for the Jetson Nano Developer Kit to the microSD card (NVIDIA's guide (opens in a new tab)).
Boot it, finish the first-run setup and connect it to the internet (needed only for installing software).

Enable SPI

SPI is off by default on the Jetson Nano. Turn it on with NVIDIA's tool:

sudo /opt/nvidia/jetson-io/jetson-io.py

In the menu: Configure 40-pin header → enable spi1 → Save and reboot. After the reboot, check:

ls /dev/spidev0.0

Then let your user use SPI and GPIO without sudo, and log out and in again:

sudo groupadd -f spi
sudo usermod -aG spi,gpio "$USER"

Mount the shield

Shut down the Jetson and unplug the power.
Line up the JNEEG with the 40-pin header so pin 1 matches pin 1.
Press it down evenly until every pin is seated.

JNEEG mounted on the Jetson Nano

Connect the electrodes

Connector	Electrode	Where it goes
Channels 1–8	8 EEG electrodes in the cap	Scalp positions of the 10-20 system
Reference	Ear-clip electrode	One earlobe
Bias	Ear-clip electrode	The other earlobe

Electrodes, reference and bias on the JNEEG header

Details: Electrodes & Pinout.

Power on from the battery

Connect the monitor, wired keyboard and mouse. The monitor must be powered from the power bank or the Jetson.
Plug the power bank into the Jetson's Micro-USB power input.
The status LED on the JNEEG lights up.

🚫

The JNEEG has no isolation from its power supply. While electrodes are on a person, the Jetson, the shield and everything cabled to them must run from the power bank only.

Install and start PiEEG Server

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install --upgrade pip
pip install "pieeg-server[rpi]"
 
pieeg-server doctor           # check SPI, GPIO and dependencies
pieeg-server --device jneeg   # start streaming 8 channels

--device jneeg applies the Jetson Nano settings automatically (600 kHz SPI, GPIO on /dev/gpiochip0).

⚠️

PiEEG Server needs Python 3.10 or newer. JetPack 4 for the Jetson Nano ships Python 3.6, so install a newer Python first (or use an image with Python 3.10+). Prefer no install? The Python scripts run on the stock Python.

Check the signal

Open http://localhost:1617 (opens in a new tab) on the Jetson, or http://<jetson-ip>:1617 from a battery-powered laptop. Click Connect, sit still and relax the face.

Test	What you should see
Sit still for 30 seconds	All 8 channels settle. Flat lines or huge values mean a loose electrode.
Close your eyes for 10 seconds	Alpha (8–13 Hz) rises on the back-of-head channels, then drops when the eyes open
Blink a few times	Large slow spikes on the front channels
Clench the jaw	Bursts of high-frequency noise on all channels. That is muscle (EMG), not brain activity.

Next steps

Record, stream, run ML: see Software.
No samples or noisy? See Troubleshooting and Noise elimination.

What's in the Box Electrodes & Pinout