Raspberry PI cm5 Hailo8l to Waveshare Nano B

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Greetings everyone. I’ve had great success with my projects using the hailo8 AI hat for the pi 5. I’ve upgraded to the CM5 and purchased the Hailo8l AI kit to create the most compact version of my project. I’m using the CM5 with a waveshare Nano B carrier board. I cannot get the CM5 to recognize the Hailo8l accelerator. I removed the Hailo8l chip from the official AI kit to a PCIe To M.2 Adapter Board (C). Any suggestions on getting the Hailo8l to work with the M.2 adapter?

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Hey @LeyvonneDWashington ,

Welcome to the Hailo Community!

The main issue you’re running into is a compatibility mismatch. Your Hailo AI-kit needs an M.2 Key E slot with PCIe x1 connection, but most CM5 carrier boards (like the Waveshare Nano B you might be using) only have M.2 Key M slots designed for NVMe drives with PCIe x4. Using a simple adapter won’t work because the electrical connections don’t line up properly.

Here’s what I’d recommend:

First, try getting a proper M.2 Key E adapter, or use the included HAT.

Second, there’s a power issue to consider. The bare Hailo-8L chip needs specific power supplies: 1.2V for the core and 3.3V for I/O, plus a precise 100MHz reference clock. The official AI-kit board handles all of this automatically, but a basic adapter won’t provide these requirements.

If you want to use an adapter, make sure it includes the necessary voltage regulators and clock generator (you can check the AI-kit schematic for the exact specifications). Otherwise, you’ll need to supply these externally.

Hope this helps get you up and running!

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Thank you very much for the reply. I’ll definitely look into an adapter that supports the M.2 E functions. Would you happen to know what gpio pins are needed for the official M.2 hat? I’m not sure the CM5 Nano B baseboard has the same gpio header layout as the standard Raspberry Pi 5. If anything, I’ll just make manual connections between the AI Hat and the baseboard.

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I got the original AI hat working! Turns out I don’t need the Hat’s gpio. It ran with just the Pcie cable.

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Happy to hear it worked!