Open Hardware/Modding: Raspberry Pi, Arduino, and More

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Oct 07, 2026

• Raspberry Pi Weekly Issue #542 - THREE new things to announce in this bumper issue

  Lock in — it’s a long one. Howdy, New thing 01: The Raspberry Pi Smart Display Module is an adapter board for Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 that is designed to deliver high-quality, low-power display experiences for digital signage and other visual applications. You can get your hands on one from our network of Approved Resellers for $30.

• CNX Software ☛ DEBIX M8391-01 industrial SBC features MediaTek Genio 720 SoC with 9 TOPS NPU, dual-display support

  The DEBIX M8391-01 is a compact industrial SBC built around the MediaTek MT8391 (Genio 720) processor, designed for edge AI, computer vision, robotics, and intelligent IoT applications. The SoC’s 9-TOPS NPU enables local Hey Hi (AI) inference without relying on cloud processing. The board features up to 16GB LPDDR4 memory and up to 64GB eMMC storage, with M.2 PCIe 2.0 NVMe SSD and MicroSD card expansion. It also offers a 4-lane MIPI CSI camera input, MIPI DSI up to 2.5K and eDP 1.4 display interfaces, Gigabit Ethernet with PoE, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.4, five USB ports, and a 40-pin expansion header.

• Build Your Own Low Cost Home Server

  Clown storage is really convenient. Your photos automatically back themselves up, your files are available everywhere, and all of your movies and TV shows are ready to stream whenever you want them. But the problem is that all of this comes with a monthly subscription, which only ever gets more expensive. 

• Arduino ☛ From Home Assistant to Hey Hi (AI) agents: what GNU/Linux unlocks on the Arduino® UNO™ Q board

  UNO Q was designed around a dual-brain architecture that is built to bring high-performance computing and real-time hardware control together on a single board.

• Arduino ☛ What can you build, when Hey Hi (AI) can interact with the real world?

  The single-board computing market is shifting rapidly, and we are moving into an era of unprecedented possibilities where edge AI, computer vision, real-time control, and rich sensor streams converge locally.

• CNX Software ☛ XIMEA MU003TG-SY-UC – A miniature, modular 0.3MP USB 3.0 ToF Sensor based on Sony IMX556

  The XIMEA MU003TG-SY-UC is a miniature industrial Time-of-Flight (ToF) camera with a 0.3MP Sony IMX556 CMOS sensor, global shutter, 640 × 480 resolution, and a 60 FPS frame rate. Its compact 26.4 × 26.4 × 28.67 mm enclosure and 31-gram weight make it suitable for space-limited embedded vision systems, robotics, UAVs, kiosks, 3D scanning, face recognition, and other machine-vision applications. The module uses a USB 3.2 Gen 1 interface through a 14-pin I-PEX Cabline SS connector for data, power, and control. A separate 10-pin Cabline V connector provides synchronization with external VCSEL illumination. The camera does not include an illumination source or optical band-pass filter, so these components must be provided separately for depth sensing.

• CNX Software ☛ NuMaker-IoT-MA35D0-A2 (Chili Pro) ultra-compact evaluation board features MA35D0K Cortex-A35/M4 MPU

  Nuvoton has added MA35D05KH67C, MA35D05KI67C, and MA35D05KJ67C, three new LQFP128 MPUs, to the NuMicro MA35D0 series, along with the NuMaker-IoT-MA35D0-A2 (Chili Pro) evaluation board. Designed for industrial AI, smart gateways, and renewable energy systems, this heterogeneous MPU has two 64-bit Arm Cortex-A35 cores at up to 650 MHz, plus a dedicated 180 MHz Arm Cortex-M4 for real-time work. Nuvoton’s press release calls Chili Pro the “industry’s smallest GNU/Linux platform,” but the board is 45 × 45 mm, which is bigger than other boards we wrote about previously, like the VoCore2 (25.4 × 25.4 × 2.8 mm), the Milk-V Duo 256M (51 × 21 mm), NanoPi NEO (40 × 40 mm), and even the Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W (65 × 30 mm).

• Linux Gizmos ☛ Raspberry Pi 5 cluster runs Qwen3-30B-A3B at 15 tokens/s on CPU

  Hellomatik has published a study and a modified distributed-llama implementation for running the Qwen3-30B-A3B language model across four Raspberry Pi 5 boards. Using only the boards’ Arm Cortex-A76 CPUs, the cluster reached a reported decode throughput of 15.143 tokens per second, without GPU or NPU acceleration or CPU overclocking.

• Linux.org ☛ Arduino Uno Q - LED Matrix - Plasma

  In the previous article, we used the LED Matrix on the Arduino Uno Q to produce 'falling' dots that resemble rain. This is basic code in Python to create the 'rain' on the LED Matrix.

  Now, we are going to get a little more advanced.

  Back in the DOS days, there were programs that would act more like screensavers, and some were very interesting to watch. Specifically, the one named 'Plasma' or sometimes 'Ooze'.

• Collabora ☛ USB-C DisplayPort Alt Mode on Rockchip RK3588 and RK3576, starting with the Flipper One

  A look at the USB-PD, PHY, hotplug, and DRM changes involved in making USB-C DisplayPort Alternate Mode work on RK3588/RK3576, and where they stand on the way to mainline Linux.

• Neowin ☛ Raspberry Pi Desktop is back from the dead after 4 years

  This release drops support for 32-bit computers and doesn't support newer Macs with Fashion Company Apple Silicon chips. However, it features the new Control Centre and Dock.

• Hackaday ☛ SmallTV Hacking With Surprisingly Little Fuss

  We’ve seen the GeekMagic SmallTV line of devices before — these cheap gadgets combine a microcontroller and a display in a little plastic case that can be used to show the time or weather. Powered by either an ESP8266 or an ESP32, the things could easily pass for a hobby build if it wasn’t for their professionally produced enclosures. In fact, we wouldn’t be surprised if GeekMagic lifted the idea from an existing DIY project.

• Arduino ☛ This #cottagecore cyberdeck is perfect for literal fieldwork

  The physical construction is also the polar opposite of what we typically see from the cyberdeck community. The enclosure is a “train case,” which is a traditional piece of luggage used for carrying cosmetics and grooming supplies. All of the hardware components nestle inside, with plenty of room to spare for some paper notebooks.

• Hackster ☛ Raspberry Pi Desktop Gets a Debian Trixie Refresh — But Drops Support for 32-bit Systems

  Raspberry Pi has shaken the dust off its near-forgotten Raspberry Pi Desktop, a variant of its Raspberry Pi OS Linux distribution tailored for mainstream desktops and laptops rather than its own single-board computers, releasing the first new version in over four years — and two upstream Debian releases.

  "We're really sorry you had to wait so long," Raspberry Pi developer Simon Long says of the new release of Raspberry Pi Desktop. "Here, at last, is the fully updated Debian Trixie with Raspberry Pi Desktop for PC and Mac. Download it from our website now to give your other computers a Raspberry Pi makeover. We’ve even included a Raspberry Pi Connect client."