Floppy8 – a tiny computer, in a floppy drive, for 4k movies & games
Floppy8 is a microcomputer and cartridge system which fits inside a floppy drive.
The Floppy8 plays 4K movies and games on custom cartridges, features wireless controllers, status lights, motorized cartridge ejection and more!
Similar to a Famicon or Super Nintendo, the cartridge sticks out, allowing the label to still be partially visible. The front button safely unmounts and ejects the cart when pressed. The RGB indicator LED flashes different colors for waiting, mounting, running and error states.
The wireless controllers are modified off-the-shelf NES clones which have a beige color and replaced d-pads along with extra added weights for that premium feel.
And for once a Raspberry Pi was not used:
I ended up purchasing a Latte Panda 3 Delta – an obscure but really wonderful device. Aside from having a built-in Arduino, it also has headers for USB, power, and more. This made running wires for buttons, ports, lights, etc trivial and despite my constant wiring mistakes the board held up and worked really well.
In my tests the performance was really reasonable for a small single board computer and in many ways, I don’t think the Floppy8 would exist without this device. Sure other single board options exist, but the Latte Panda was really perfect. The only complaint I have is that documentation is minimal, but because the hardware is basically an x86 machine with an embedded Arduino in a tiny package, I did not feel the need for complex docs.
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Python for Microcontrollers – Adafruit Daily — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: Open Hardware is In, New CircuitPython and Pi 5 16GB, and much more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi
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