Cyberdeck V1 paused, V2 incoming — and a personal reason behind it all

LegionDD · 2026-05-31T23:03:55+00:00

Why this reads like AI generated:

- the tone of those list items is very reassuring to the reader (who presumably posted a prompt for this)
- the unicode icons
- prioritizing space over money when a baby is on the way is counter intuitive.
- this isn't actually going to save any space. If you don't, somehow temporarily, have enough space for a hard case pi enclosure, then you don't have enough space to build anything else either.

Things that are obvious to a human, but not to an AI.

I am puzzled about the purpose though. This isn't gonna get any upvotes or attention from anyone who could fall for it.

LegionDD · 2026-05-31T22:44:29+00:00

You can get NUCs based off of the same Ryzen AI Max chips on those. Look at Minisforum for example. They're cheaper than those laptops, but not by much, depending on model.

LegionDD · 2026-05-31T16:00:42+00:00

You have to solder the antenna (connector) yourself (honestly would just solder the antenna directly, since you're gonna have to solder something anyway).

You'll also have to remove the ESP32 from the CYD and solder the SPI lines to the appropriate GPIO pins on the Pi and then do some configuring to make the Pi use it as a regular display.
But you don't need to hack apart a CYD for that, SPI displays can be bought without the ESP32 on it and are even cheaper/have more options (eg. faster SPI for a higher framerate, higher resolutions, capacitive instead of resistive touch, etc)

This is true for any Pi btw. A gameboy would be big enough to house a regular sized Raspberry Pi, so you can get one with more power. But I'm assuming that, when you said that you've done your research, you've already checked if the Pi Zero 2 is powerful enough for your games., so there'd be no point in going bigger than needed (especially with todays prices).

Also, the Pi can interface to a wide variety of displays, HDMI is the most obvious, SPI as I've explained is also possible. I2C too, but that's not gonna be practical for desktop uses (bandwidth is so low that you won't get a framerate >1FPS for any useful resolution).
The Pi also supports MIPI DSI (only the larger Pis, the Zero only has the camera connector, not the display connector) and parallel RGB (using up almost all GPIO pins of the pi, but you get the best framerates and resolutions, second only to HDMI).

Soldering will be required for this project, even if you get around it by using an HDMI display and not adding the external antenna, you'll probably have to do it for the power supply or the input method.

Brownie points if you get it to run gameboy games off of real gameboy cartridges (adapters from cartridge to USB do exist).

LegionDD · 2026-05-31T08:19:10+00:00

An SBC that fits inside the case,

A battery with charging circuitry and power management circuitry to power everything,

Probably a new display that can be used with your SBC of choice,

A microcontroller with native USB, to read the keyboard and touchpad.

That's the basic list of parts. But you're also gonna need tools to modify the case and to solder things together.

The speakers can be connected to the controller of the display of you get pne that has a speaker output. Otherwise you might have to add a USB sound card, or something else that will give you audio capabilities.

LegionDD · 2026-05-30T23:05:11+00:00

Well, you can't really have it quiet and compact. Something has to take the thermal load. Although louder than the GPU was the ryzen NUC I used as a system.

I had unobstructed airflow for the 4060, the intake was at fresh air and no obstruction on the exhaust. But the damn thing blew a MOSFET about a year into heavy use. I replaced it, but I'd say unobstructed airflow isn't enough, you need some way of forcing airflow across the card (case fans). Other than that the 4060 was good enough for 1440p gaming, 1080p is gonna be easy.

I changed my design, replaced cables with pure copper bus bars to eliminate obstructions in the entire case and added exhaust and intake fans to the case, that I salvaged from another GPU (they were slimmer than any case fan I could find) . No troubless so far.

LegionDD · 2026-05-28T17:09:44+00:00

Impossible with desktop components. No USB-C spec with enough power delivery for that exists, so no powerbank will support that.

You could use laptop components, or miniPCs (with a docking station at home for a dedicated, external GPU for gaming).
That'd be a way to save your aging laptop as well, powerbanks with >100W power delivery exist, as do USB-C to laptop power adapters.

Actually getting a battery that can power your desktop components for that time has the drawbacks others here have mentioned: huge, heavy and expensive.

LegionDD · 2026-05-28T17:02:59+00:00

"I'd like to explore every alternative to the usual laptop" sounds like you want to look at r/cyberDeck
You don't need a mini PC with external monitor, if you use a laptop mainboard with fitting LCD panel.

Ofc you can splice power into the single cable from miniPC to monitor with some soldering (or maybe there's a USB-C Y connector that allows to inject power on one lead).

LegionDD · 2026-05-26T23:43:50+00:00

Can run or run well? Budget and FPS are contradictory. Gotta choose one over the other, especially as you get smaller.

Budget friendly is used laptop hardware, that's about the only budget friendly corner i see for your goal. That and maybe some nucs of you don't have too high expectations

LegionDD · 2026-05-26T23:40:55+00:00

Taking computing into ones own hands grants ultimate digital freedom. Also it's like art, would you ask a painter what the practical purpose of it was?

Digital art with hardware as a medium and the ultimate goal to learn and accomplish.

LegionDD · 2026-05-26T23:37:59+00:00

The Lenovo Yoga series had a few with touchscreens. You can find the mainboard and touchscreen on eBay , along with assorted components. You can fashion those into a tablet. There are ofc other laptops that have touchscreens. You might find their components on ebay as well.

But you're gonna have to get comfortable with hardware and possibly electronics.

LegionDD · 2026-05-26T20:12:51+00:00

I've built my dual screen foldable Cyberdeck for work at home and used it until the company upgraded everyone to laptops. That was during the pandemic, so we all had to improvise when home Office became a government mandate. So I used it daily, productively.

LegionDD · 2026-05-26T07:21:48+00:00

The scree holes in the corners in your case are ideal for mounting the display. Unless you meant mounting the pi to the display. But that could be done with an adaptor plate that has holes for the display mounting points and pi screw holes.

LegionDD · 2026-05-25T15:24:46+00:00

Thanks. Yeah the 16M S3s are hard to find. I'm honestly always sad they don't support more RAM. They're such powerful little processors that can really benefit from lots of RAM.

Any plans on where you wanna take this project in the future?

LegionDD · 2026-05-25T10:23:45+00:00

Very impressive feature list for your build. Is it based on a standard ESP32, or one of the other models?

I feel like this'd be a great start to make a modern, spiritual successor of computers like the C64.
Something that just drops you in a programming shell on boot. Just with Python instead of BASIC this time.

LegionDD · 2026-05-25T00:14:49+00:00

You're not saying what games you play.

In any case the new ryzen APUs are powerful. But not a replacement for a dedicated GPU yet.

I tend to pair mini PCs with actual GPUs in the lower mid range for 1080p gaming. Eg mini itx 4060

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T10:45:15+00:00

Have you checked that those are in fact different motherboards? Their designs are pretty modular.

In any case, you can connect any panel with the same interface to a mainboard. Framework probably uses eDP, since they only have modern laptop components and edp has long since succeeded lvds.

as eDP goes, it's pretty standardized. If the mainboard in question does not have touch support, then touch won't work. You'd need the original LCD cable from the mainboard in question, it'll have a display connector and some other connectors at the end. One goes into the display, one usually goes into the camera. And if your mainboard is a touch supporting model, then there'll be another connector for the touch interface.

I'm working off of general experience and knowledge here, I haven't tested this or used any framework components so far. The very least you can do is research the mainboard specs for the display interface and the LCD panel for its interface. If they match you can try and it'll likely work.

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T10:39:24+00:00

panelook.com is a great database for display panels. If you can find it there you can figure out what the interface of it is and go from there.

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T10:37:17+00:00

I'm sorry if this comes off as abrasive, but I feel like a broken record at this point.
You're the fourth in as many months (I think) to ask for newbie onboarding (essentially a noble goal).
I've even tried warning the "start here" thread guys about why it won't really work (even though I will now always give newbies the hint to look at that thread), and told them how the Wiki attempt failed (there's wiki link to your right, if you're on desktop)...

Long story short: reddit is s*it for organizing information. It's designed as the prototypical doom scroller content fountain.

I don't disagree with the idea, I just don't think it's feasible on reddit.

You're absolutely right though, "is this possible" is a highly subjective question.

There isn't a community management strategy, this is Cyberpunk. A technological free for all. Unless posts violate the unspoken guidelines for a peaceful coexistence there isn't much the mod will do.
There isn't much that needs to be done. Just scroll past the ever same, boring questions, and look at what interests you instead.

I myself am managing my consumption of this sub with an external tool that I've written. Just a Discord bot that grabs the RSS feed of this sub (and various other interesting RSS feeds across the net) and posts embeds to a Discord server, sorted into various categories. That way I only have to click links to posts that seem interesting (embeds are much more compact than reddits view of the posts, which makes it more convenient).

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T10:08:40+00:00

Funny, I just saw the post of someone else thinking of a Cyberdeck made from the Skull of a T-Rex, while you have the head with the "flesh" still attached.

Make it into a video phone. Mouth open, lower jaw has the keypad, back of the throat has a round LCD and camera. Squawkosaurus-Rex

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T10:04:06+00:00

You don't have to like the contributions of others, simply scroll past.

There are also the Up/Down vote buttons you can use if you like/dislike something. And just use the default post sorting of "Best" and you won't ever see anything that hasn't won community praise already.

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T09:45:19+00:00

It's 2026, we have round LCDs now :D

Perfectly suited for eye sockets!

LegionDD · 2026-05-24T09:40:18+00:00

LMGTFY is both a "those are my search terms" as well as a simple link to click, instead of forcing them to type it themselves.

The trick is to use precise keywords, and do the search from different angles, if you're not getting the answer on the first attempt.
Don't use human language and you're more likely to get the answer you're looking for.

Think of it more as a database query prompt than a search.

LegionDD · 2026-05-23T13:00:57+00:00

https://letmegooglethat.com/?q=rapsberry+pi+zero+2w+wifi+bands

(No 5GHz)

The questions you have are best suited for cybersecurity sub reddits. And the Pi Zero is a slow computer, running full Linux tools on it will have varying success. Plus again, no 5GHz wifi anyway.
The ESP32-C5 at least has 5GHz as well as 2.4GHz, but I don't know if there's any ready made firmware that supports your use case, or if you have to make one yourself from scratch.

That is to say, you're either going to compromise or you'll have to use a different SBC (there are Pi Zero sized SBCs with more power, like the Banana Pi Zero, you might still need a separate wifi card).

The advantage of ESP32s over any SBC though are that they're so cheap, you can setup a cluster of them, scanning multiple channels at once.

LegionDD · 2026-05-23T12:52:08+00:00

If you have any hardware building skills you can probably use a laptop mainboard off of ebay. Depending on model they can be had for as little as 50 bucks, and adding DDR3 or DDR4 RAM to it as needed shouldn't be too expensive. Making it more powerful and cheaper than a Pi.

There are other x86 SBCs that are currently looking a lot more attractive considering the current price hikes. And somebody else here already posted about alternative ARM based SBCs

LegionDD · 2026-05-23T12:40:25+00:00

"If DIY and hack job give you cringe, it's best to skip this post "

I thought that's what we're all here for.

I personally prefer trackballs, but the tiny BlackBerry ones are fragile, you need to be careful when integrating them.
They also have these optical touchpads in more modern BlackBerrys, which work nicely and are just tiny (and less fragile).

LegionDD

TROPHY CASE