Category: Making a Cyber Deck

As I work on designing my own Cyber Deck from scratch, I’ve been finding that if I want to keep the functionality of the Raspberry Pi 5, I need to find or get various extension adapters so that I can access all of the ports that the Raspberry Pi provides.

The screen that I bought, the RC070S 7inch 1024*600 IPS Capacitive Touch Monitor from Elecrow is pretty awesome. I wanted a bigger screen than the one in the Pi Flux but I didn’t want to give up the resolution. What I liked about the Elecrow screen is that it comes with some of the adapter plugs so that I could mount the Raspberry Pi on the back without needing to purchase those adapters separately.

Stuff Just Laying Around

This has worked out well, but it also means that the Raspberry Pi will be encased in the middle of any build that I make and not have much access to the outside unless I add some adapters, which is pretty much what I need to do. Luckily, some of the items that I need were already in my Pi Flux, so I’m just cannibalizing those, specifically, the micro-SD card reader and the rechargeable battery, a 10,000 mAh power bank from INIU. But I would like to have access to the other USB ports in case I want to add more peripherals. Again I had a USB hub that I wasn’t using so I can add that.

But now I’m to the point where if I need more access to the Pi, I will need to buy more adapters to add to it. So for example, I would like to have access to the Network Port, which means I need: Panel Mount Ethernet Extension Cable from Adafruit.

Then, I needed to connect the Pi’s USB to the screen’s USB in order for the touch screen to work so I got another adapter from Newegg, a Up Angled USB 2.0 Type-A Male to Micro USB 5Pin Male Data Flat Slim FPC Cable for FPV & Disk & Phone 100CM.

Next, I need a way to turn the Pi on/off while using the power bank so I may try the SparkFun Soft Power Switch – USB-C.

Another reason that I was thinking about using the Pi Flux was to add more radios and antennas to collect GPS/LoRa and Real Time Clock data. There is a hat for the Raspberry Pi Hacker Gadgets, but this will also require Uxcell Antenna Extension Cables to connect the antennas to the Raspberry Pi.

Finally, I would like to utilize the stereo headphone jack on the Elecrow screen and this will require another short adapter from Digikey.

This doesn’t even include how I’m going to power or charge the Rii keyboard that I plan on using.

So this Cyber Deck project is starting to get a little more complicated as I go along.

I’ve been interested in Cyber Decks for a while now, probably since I saw the Uconsole from Clockwork Pi about a year ago. But even before that the idea of having a portable handheld computer goes back to my middle school days when the first calculators came out and I was very jealous of my friend who had one and could make it do all kinds of things I don’t think it was Texas Instruments one, but it was definitely a knock-off.

Then of course there was the Tricorder from the Original Star Trek, who could not want one of those.

So I have gotten a couple of cyberdecks recently: a PiFlux from Carbon computers and a Pocketterm 35 from Waveshare. While both have come with good attributes, they still haven’t really scratched my itch of a totally customizable computing device. I thought the PiFlux would have a way of running Kali Linux and then I could use it to work on my hacking skills, but I have not been able to get beyond just a regular Raspberry build. The Waveshare screen that comes with it just can’t seem to run with Kali Linux.

The Pocketterm 35 works better for what I got it for, a game emulator for my daughter, and it can run Kali Linux too, but the 4-inch screen does not give me much room to do too much.

So I’m planning on building my own design. I’ll be using the parts from the PiFlux, but adding a bigger screen, a different keyboard with touchpad and my own 3D printed case. I’ll be posting here as I go so that everyone can learn along with me.