As anyone who’s made a thing knows, a lot of work goes into bringing something from idea to completion. But there’s also considerable satisfaction in the process. [Willian] recently did exactly that, and shares the joyful experience of creating a homebrew handheld game gadget from scratch. It runs a homebrewed Tetris clone (as well as […]
The ESP32-P4 is the new hotness on the microcontroller market. With RISC-V architecture and two cores running 400 MHz, to ears of a certain vintage it sounds more like the heart of a Unix workstation than a traditional MCU. Time’s a funny thing like that. [DynaMight] was looking for an excuse to play with this […]
As single board computers have become ever smaller and more powerful, so have those experimenting with them tried to push the boundaries of the machines they can be used in. First we had cyberdecks, and now we have handheld terminals. Of this latter class we have a particularly nice example from [Random Alley Cat]. It […]
The rise of inexpensive yet relatively powerful electronics has enabled a huge array of computing options that would have been unheard of even two decades ago. A handheld gaming PC with hours of battery life, for example, would have been impossible or extremely expensive until recently. But this revolution has also enabled a swath of […]
If you’re a retro Nintendo fan you can of course carry a NES and a Game Boy around with you, but the former isn’t very portable. Never fear though, because here’s [Chad Burrow], who’s created a neat handheld console that emulates both. It’s called the Acolyte Handheld, and it sports the slightly unusual choice for […]
A new console challenger has appeared, and it goes by the name Nintendo Switch 2. The company’s latest iteration of the home console portable hybrid initially showed promise by featuring a large 1080p display, though very little official footage of the handheld existed prior to the device’s global release last week. However, thanks to a […]
[Tommy] has a great write-up about designing and building a minimalistic handheld electronic game called “Higher Lower”. It’s an audio-driven game in which the unit plays two tones and asks the player to choose whether the second tone was higher in pitch, or lower. The game relies on 3D printed components and minimal electronics, limiting […]
The MintyPi was a popular project that put a Raspberry Pi inside an Altoids tin to make a pocketable gaming handheld. Unfortunately, it’s not the easiest build to replicate anymore, but [jackw01] was still a fan of the format. Thus was born the Pi Tin—a clamshell handheld for portable fun! Neat, huh? More pocket-sized than […]
Pong was one of the first video games to really enter the public consciousness. While it hasn’t had the staying power of franchises like Zelda or Call of Duty, it nonetheless still resonates with gamers today. That includes [Arnov Sharma], who put together this neat handheld version using modern components. An ESP32 development board serves as the brains […]
A few weeks ago we brought you news of a new palmtop computer for hackers, powered by the new Espressif ESP32-P4 application processor. The Tanmatsu (Japanese for “Terminal”) is a compact handheld device with a QWERTY keyboard and an 800×480 DSI display, and while it currently exists at the final prototype stage there is a […]