Nintendo showed it was really listening to its retro-infatuated fan base when it announced the Nintendo Classic Mini — a micro-NES console with 30 built-in games. However, it turns out that you can go much smaller, as a fan has proved with the unveiling of his mini-SNES, which is far more minute than Nintendo’s own hardware.
Created as part of the Rated-E Mods show on YouTube, developer lyberty5 put together the micro-games console with a combination of emulator hardware, a USB hub and a plastic/clay shell. It was built using a Raspberry Pi Zero, a generic USB hub for controllers and a seductively gravelly voice.
Once the interior of the casing was carved from plastic, lyberty5 shaped clay on top of it to great the physical design of the original SNES, but in micro form. It gets several sanding jobs, epoxy fillings, and eventually a spray coat to make it look the part.
Once the case is created, the electronics needed to be constructed. There was a bit of soldering and gluing involved, and everything was bathed in epoxy resin to give it all a little more strength to prevent the internals being yanked around when plugging in and unplugging controllers.
And from there it’s just a case of installing emulator software on to the little device. That sort of programming has been available for years already, so there was no issue with getting that up and running. There is also a much larger library of games that could be placed (admittedly with dubious legality) on such a mini-emulator, giving the owner access to all sorts of games.
Of course you’d need to have a few technical skills of your own to follow along at home, but this is far from the most complicated build we’ve seen come out of lyberty5.
