The Bitbox console

The Bitbox console is a small (6.5cmx5cm, 2.5"x2") open hardware, open source DIY 32-bit VGA console based on a single microcontroller chip.

Previous (great !) retro-DIY consoles were 8bit consoles. I wanted to make a tinkerer console based on a beefier MCU, capable of producing Amiga or SNES - like graphics (or even higher !) and interfacing with modern devices.

With this console, you can try yourself developing new bare-metal games - on a big screen, try other people games, program optimized kernels, games and demos to revive the old days of skillful game development, only on modern CPU and interfaces.

Development is eased by a SDL simulator, which allows development of game logic on PC (there are instructions for developing under linux and windows), while optimizing the game engine on the real hardware. Programs can be debugged on-chip and executed step by step with a ST-Link adapter (available for less than $10).

A two-stage boot loader allows loading graphically the games from the microSD card with a USB device.

Specs

• Based on the STM32F4 chip including 512kB Flash and 192kB SRAM
• 15 bit (32768 colors) color VGA with a resistive DAC.
• Software based signal generation, DMA based. Resolution : Variable, standard resolution of 640x480 @ 60 Hertz
• Stereo 12bit Audio DAC, sampling frequency (generally using 8bit audio)
• microSD driven by 4wire SDIO (6 MB/s transfers tested)
• 1 user button / user LED
• 2 USB 2.0 host
• microUSB socket for power (may be used for loading firmware by soldering 2 solder jumpers)
• UEXT extension port (I2C, UART and SPI) to link to your own hardware bits
• SWD port to debug programs on chip
• SDL based emulator available to develop on PC (source/API-based simulation)

Support of HID USB gamepads, mice and keyboard is available for some models, and added along the way - it's generally merely entering a few more values in a table.

Projects

There are several games already existing for the bitbox (small ones, but several others are being made !) There is also a working gnuboy port (GameBoy emulator) running existing games (but note that the main focus of bitbox is to have native games).

Additional info

Much more information about the Bitbox is available on the project blog and main pages.

Sold product is soldered and tested, and does not include cables and microSD card.

Please leave a tip if you would like me to release a (cheaper) kit instead of a fully assembled device.