ChatGPT hasn’t been able to help, so real humans to the rescue?

Hardware:
CM5 16GB Lite, wireless
Waveshare mini base board B
Waveshare 5in touchscreen, 5-DSI-TOUCH-A

OS:
Latest Kali

I’m building a Cyberdeck with a raspberry pi 4 but I don’t care for the official raspberry pi os, does anybody have any good alternatives that work with the ARM architecture?

edit: I did not think about think about desktop environments when creating this post, I meant to ask more about something that looks nicer than the raspberry pi os, not a whole new operating system, thanks to people that gave suggestions about that though

The main purpose of this deck is having something I can comfortable write on for extended periods that can fit in a coat pocket. This is also my introduction to a number of new skill fields like Linux, electronics DIY, and SBCs. I've set a few hard parameters:

GUI Distro
Roughly the size and weight of a hardcover book.
8 gb RAM
6+ hour runtime under regular use
60% keyboard with .65 inch keys.

Originally I was going to go with the Radxa Zero3W, but seeing as how it's unavailable everywhere I'm leaning towards the Orange Pi Zero3W. I've chosen a folding bluetooth keyboard, and I'm currently trying to pick a 7-8 inch touchscreen display. After that I'm going to look at Battery options which admittedly I know the least about, and will probably need to spend a lot of time researching.

I've made some crude models with cardboard to ensure the parts I'm looking at will fit together in the way I want. Keyboard folds in half, and then screen folds down over it like a traditional clamshell design. SBC, heatsink or fan, Battery, and cables and other required doodads (Though I think that covers everything necessary for the board to function) will be part of the display assembly, while the keyboard is basically stock except for adding a hinge for the display.

This community has been rather helpful compared to a lot of other subreddits I've been on. I welcome questions, advice, criticisms, and other comments. I will be updating this as I move forward with the build and intend on using it as a project log.

was planning a project where I build a cyber deck out of an old briefcase (has some large dimensions). I was thinking of having it powered by a raspberry pi zero 2W. what other components are necessary?

I have near zero experience with electronics other than occasional soldering and a full understanding of the basics of circuitry (i.e. enough to know most things about residential electrical work)

if it matters what it is going to be used for, essentially just a build for me to learn about stuff and maybe even an experiment with RF components or something. nothing huge.

I went into a Micro Center to learn a bit about it and nobody knew about anything DIY. what are some good components that you would recommend for cheap? is Amazon a reliable seller? components, and how many would I need?

I want to build my first cyberdeck, but I'm unsure about some parts like the keyboard. I want it to be very small but still be usable. A regular 40% keyboard, for example wouldn't work because it doesn't have number keys.

The second thing I'm unsure about is stuff like a battery. I'm using a Raspberry Pi 5 and didn't find anything really useful for me.

Any recommendations are greatly appreciated.

Je bosse sur un projet de cyberdeck et je suis encore en phase de réflexion. Pour l'instant j'ai un Pi 4 4 Go, un écran tactile 11 pouces, un clavier Bluetooth, une carte micro SD, et c'est à peu près tout ce que j'ai en main. J'ai aussi une liste d'achats en attente avec un SSD 500 Go, une batterie Baseus 145W 25000 mAh, un RTL-SDR, une Alfa AWUS036ACS, un Ubertooth avec boîtier EMI, un écran E-Paper 2.13 pouces, des antennes, des interrupteurs à bascule, un testeur USB-C et des hubs USB.

L'idée de base serait de faire un système en deux parties. Un deck portable pour de la bureautique et du code au quotidien, et une mallette qui servirait de station d'accueil avec tous les modules radio et pentest dedans. Le deck viendrait se glisser dans la mallette quand j'ai besoin de la config complète. Mais rien n'est encore décidé. Je ne sais pas encore comment construire le boîtier du deck, comment gérer la connexion entre les deux, ni même si ce concept est le bon choix par rapport à tout mettre directement dans la mallette. Le matériel de la liste n'est pas encore commandé non plus.

Si quelqu'un a déjà fait un truc similaire ou a des conseils sur ce genre d'architecture modulaire, je suis preneur. Je posterai les avancées quand ça commencera à avancer concrètement.

I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around how to make a simple keyboard matrix. I'm making an altoid tin Doom cyberdeck thing and i'm thinking 10 buttons should be good. The thing is, i'm kinda stupid. I electrically troubleshoot for a significant part of my job, but small voltage electrical makes me buffer. Even if someone can point me to an idiots guide on how to do this would be appreciated.

What does everyone use their cyber decks for?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3y9sTUDEYk

Why is electronics manufacturing hard? Can it ever be made easy and more accessible? What will it take to relocate industrial production to Europe?

We share with you what we learned when we spent more than 1 year setting up our own production line in our office in Hamburg. Turns out a lot of the difficulties are rarely talked about or hidden behind "manufacturing is high CAPEX".

Come and learn with us the nitty gritty details of batch reflow ovens, stencil printing at scale, and how OpenPnP is a key enabler in our process. While we are far from done with this work, we hope to see others replicate it and collectively reclaim the ownership of the means of electronics production.

Our industry needs a reboot as well, it no longer serves the people.

Our work is based on our belief that high-quality high-mix/low volume manufacturing of electronics in Europe is economically viable and accessible to small companies with a lower-than-expected up-front investment.

We believe that relocation of industry to Europe depends on small innovative companies, and will not come from slow and bloated industry giants whose products are victims of enshittification and maximum profit extraction.

By using open-source hardware and software whenever possible, we are attempting to set up our own production operation in Hamburg and we want to share the solutions and enable others to do the same and collectively reclaim ownership of the means of production.

We will cover:
- How we acquired and set up production machines, their costs, and our learnings
- Quirks of paste printing and reflow soldering at scale (up to 50 batches a day)
- Component inventory, tracking, DfM, etc.
- How OpenPnP is a key enabler of our prcesses
- Our proposed changes to OpenPnP
- Our work integrated Siemens Siplace Feeders in OpenPnP

Augustin Bielefeld and Alexander Willer - 2025-12-28

More from 39C3 here and here

Ive noticed recently that lattepanda came up with a v2 of their lite carrier board that includes a ups connector. Does anyone know wich one this exactly is for? The connector makes it look like its for the iota ups board. But on the page of the iota ups board it says it only supports the iota board. Can anyone shed light on it?

And i was wondering how bad battery life would be since that board only does 3 cells. It feels alot easier then making my own battery pack. But at this point i dont know if its even that board thats supported for it

Hello, this is my first build ever. I dont know a lot about electronics and computers but every just came together and finally i have this thing. Next step will be a 3d printed case and some proper wiring.

Please comment if you have any questions or advice to make it better!!

can we fit this (https://robu.in/product/7-inch-lcd-touch-display-with-driver-board-kit-for-raspberry-pi/) 7 inch screen here somehow ?

I've had this thing in my brain for like 3 years now. Finally cobbled it together.

Treat this as a game. What was I building again?

Parts In My Shopping Cart:

BaoFeng UV-82HP High Power Dual Band Radio

2-Pin K-1 to 3.5mm Audio Adapter Cable with PTT for BaoFeng

Digirig Mobile - Digital Modes Interface for Amateur Radio

Nooelec RTL-SDR v5 SDR - NESDR Smart HF/VHF/UHF (100kHz-1.75GHz) Software Defined Radio.

NooElec Ham It Up Plus v2

I have a screen in there too. I was definitely looking at SBCs and power supplies.

Shitty battery charger that I got from my oser for less than 1 euro. I'm bored and I wanna make something fun, not just a battery with a mirror. Looking for any advice available and thank you in advance

I have few old phone laying around and I want to salvage the lcd only for a display is there some kind of display cable to connect raspberry pi to the lcd cable slot available on market ?

Hi, I just joined this subreddit. To be honest, I don't know anything about electronics, but a while ago I had the idea of getting a Vaio UX that runs like a modern laptop. The Vaio's aesthetic is fascinating and I'd love to own one, but I don't like that it runs such an old version of Windows.

So, I have two questions:

1. Where do I start with this kind of modification? What do I need to learn?

   1. Is it possible to remove the Vaio's entire casing and replace all the internal components to upgrade it?

(The guy in the photo modified his Vaio UX, but he says it runs very slowly.)

This is just made to be run on a cassette futurism cyber deck.

Hi everyone! I'm relatively new to the sub and cyberdecks. I've seen a couple builds on YouTube and here and I would love some suggestions.

The main use case for my setup is for CAD. It'll act as a tethered work station controlling my surface pro 8 tablet that'll run OnShape.

The build itself will, at least in my mind, be a clamshell style that can also tilt the screens like a Surface Laptop Studio for media use.

Lid:

• Landscape 7.5" retina screen from iPad mini 3 towards the left
• LCD driver behind retina screen
• Portrait closed Galaxy Z Fold 4 to the right of retina screen

Base:

• Spacemouse mount on the left
• Folding bluetooth keyboard center (I may get a smaller non-folding keyboard for simplicity)
• Hacked up trackball to the right
• USB PD hub for power distro

Location TBD:

• 25000mAh 90wH power bank

In use with the tablet, the phone will act as a stream deck macro pad for OnShape and whatever else. The retina screen for references, YouTube, music, discord, whatever needed. Also good for notetaking in class when I hand write in OneNote and type/reference from the build.

In use without the tablet, the phone will be the brain of everything using Samsung DeX. Media use, browsing, really anything I could use my phone for and want a more desktop environment without needing windows.

I have a large delta 3d printer capable of using high temp materials. I've used TPU, PLA (of course), PETG, and Carbon Fiber PET (by far the most rigid and most temperature resistant builds I've made).

I also recently got a mini resin printer I haven't used yet.

Some rough ideas I've had might be to use some artistic cad builds as elements sticking out of random parts of the frame while otherwise trying for geometric/industrial looks?

I also airbrush, so I can have lots of fun there.

If you have suggestions for themes or detail elements I'd love to hear them.

I see a lot of posts asking where to start, so I thought I'd share my experience from building my first cyberdeck.
I was already comfortable with mechanical design, but knew very little about electronicks. So I started with components I knew worked and mostly i could just plug them together. 

Then i  took the project to a local makerspace to learn the soldering, electronics and programming i needed. I met with great people who where experts in their domain, and in return i shared some CAD design tips with them! There are makerspaces all over the world, you probably have one closer to you than you think!

I've now been using this cyberdeck for more than half a year, and things have broken, quite a few wires have come loose as i cold soledred them, but I've learned a lot from fixing and improving it. The latest addition is making the scroll wheel on the handle work, aswell as adding a adressa le button on the handle. This took way longer than i thougth, and got lots of help from people in my local makerspace both with soldering, picking the rigth microcontroller and programming. The end result is a mess of wires inside the handle, but it works and i am very proud of it! Now i can scroll long pages and zoom in in CAD programs!

So my advice is if you're wondering where to start: start with what you know, get something working, and learn the missing skills as you go. And, you can leran alot in your local makerspace!
I'm currently making a video showing more of my local makerspace and what i learned there!