My Covid-19 home project has been my own version of a cyberdeck. If you're unfamiliar with cyberdecks, they're basically homemade laptops with some specific stylistic design features. Typically this includes a keyboard, off-center screen or no screen, and an HMD. My personal take on it is a little more lax in the style department, and looks slightly more like a rugged modular hacker's laptop.

Like many other cyberdecks, I have based my build on a Raspberry Pi 4B with 4GB of RAM. I'm still looking around at OS software, but I'm currently running PiOS until I find something I really like. I would like to get Kali Linux running on it, but the current version will require some significant setup, so I'm holding off on that until it becomes a more pressing matter.

The main appeal of my design is that the case is built entirely out of folded aluminum. This makes the case far stronger than anything 3D printed. Since I tend to be a little hard on things that I carry around on a daily basis, I needed something strong but workable. The downside of using aluminum is that the WiFi and Bluetooth signals are almost completely killed, making connecting to routers or wireless devices nearly impossible. As a result, I've had to resort to installing an external antenna. While designing the case, I ended up making a parametric design in OpenSCAD to simplify and basically automate the design process. All you have to do is measure the screen you intend on using, your material thickness, and decide on some offsets. The script will then provide you with a printable pattern that can be glued to the material you're using to help with the cuts you need to make before folding it into a box with a lid. The lid becomes the back panel of the screen. I first mocked it up in paper, followed by cardboard, then after I cut and bent the aluminum, I hand drilled, cut,and filed the holes for the screen, USB ports, antenna, and fan.

The best part of all this is that I pretty much have a case that is endlessly customizeable. I can easily make any holes I need with some basic hand tools, I have a little extra space for upgrades like an SSD drive, and I don't have to worry about my Raspberry Pi being damaged at all. It's tough. The screen is admittedly a little exposed, but that's fine by me. Once I finally get the proper torque hinges, it will be much better protected by the keyboard and battery. I extended one of each of the USB ports, so I have one internal USB2 and one internal USB3 port and the same accessible externally. I intend on extending the second unused micro HDMI port as a standard HDMI port, but that's a project for the future. Currently I have no use for such a thing. Everything is being designed with the idea of portability, durability, repairability, and mod-ability. Also I REALLY wanted a folding keyboard.

Below you can find some pictures of the mostly finished body/screen design. I still need to get those hinges and finish up the keyboard/battery area. I didn't do any step by step photos, nor will I be making any step by step instructions. A cyberdeck is supposed to be a reflection of the builder, so anyone who feels compelled to build one should experiment and flex their creative muscles instead of copying another's design. That being said, I'd be happy if you used my script for designing LCD cases for any project, cyberdeck or otherwise. I think it would work well with any thin cardboard or sheet metals. I also plan on making a few how-tos concerning some of the raspberry pi specific mods. Information related to connecting an external antenna, for example, is available, but it's not well collected or very descriptive over all. I had to make a lot of educated guesses.
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