I made this video to walk you through the process of building your own, step-by-step. Even if you don’t plan on building your own, give it a watch and you’ll definitely learn some interesting things!

The rest of this guide will show you the project, explain some cool things about it, and tell you how I made it.

Since most people want to see the final product first.. here’s the finished Retrobox!

Here’s one more photo showcasing the artwork (more on that later!)

So this was actually a bit of a time challenge — my friend’s birthday party was in two days, and though I’d kicked around the idea of creating the Retrobox for a while, I basically ordered everything with Amazon One-Day shipping and had one night to build it.

Unfortunately, the UPS guy and Florida weather decided the project wasn’t important and left everything in the rain. Luckily, everything in the box was waterproof, so after letting things dry, I could get started.

Here’s a final photo of guts of my Retrobox. As you can see, it uses a Raspberry Pi (running RetroPie) for the actual video game emulation; also inside are the small PCB (printed circuit board) that lets the Pi recognize the buttons/joystick as a controller. Also visible are my custom power button (more on this later) and, in the front left, a power/status LED. This is the joystick kit I used.

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Raspberry Pi 3 B+

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Arcade button/joystick USB kit, illuminated (LED)

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The main housing is a basic project enclosure. Buttons and a joystick are fed through holes that I drilled in the project enclosure. I used a 1-1/8″ hole saw bit to cut them. You can also use a spade bit, step drill bit, or Dremel circle cutting bit to cut the holes. This is the template I used to drill the holes.

The buttons and joystick are connected to a small controller board that allows computers (including the Raspberry Pi) to recognize the entire set of buttons as a USB controller. One nice thing about this project is that no soldering is required — the button assembly I used comes with a wiring loom that’s plug-and-play.

Because the board turns the buttons/joystick into a universal USB gamepad, you can also connect the Retrobox directly to your computer or mobile device to play games there (essentially bypassing the internal Raspberry Pi).

After installing RetroPie and adding your ROMs, the Retrobox hooks right up to your TV or monitor and you’re good to go.

To get the button placement just right, I used a custom artwork template used for the Pimoroni Picade. I traced it directly on my monitor as I don’t have a 2D printer.

I cut a piece of acrylic for the top so that I could display some sweet artwork underneath it. I cut the acrylic using my bandsaw, but you can also cut it using a box cutter by scoring it repeatedly and then snapping it along a flat edge.

The acrylic top also gives it more of an arcade machine feel!

You can use whatever artwork you’d like beneath the acrylic top. I found a sweet retro wallpaper online made by artist Luis Carrasquillo, cropped it to the portion I liked best, and had it printed on an 8″ x 8″ piece of photo paper at my local CVS for about a dollar.

When choosing your artwork, make sure it’s large enough for it to not look pixelated. You want the image to be a high enough resolution that it can be printed at 300DPI (300 dots per inch). For example, if you printed a 1″ x 1″ photo at 300DPI, it would need to be 300px x 300px in size. 300DPI is a common print resolution for printing high quality photos (your monitor is closer to 72DPI, so a 72px x 72px image on your monitor will be about an inch in size). But I digress..

Cutting the button holes in the artwork is easy — I just used a box cutter to carefully cut them out.

I intentionally ran the controller circuit board cable external to the enclosure so that it could be used with my computer or Picade. It also works with mobile phones, but I don’t usually play games there.

Also pictured here are my terrible cutting job and my DIY Raspberry Pi power button. The power button isn’t really necessary (as you can shut the Pi down through the RetroPie interface), but it’s convenient and neat!

I chose a generic joystick/button combo from Amazon that had great reviews. The buttons are all backlit using LEDs and are powered from the Pi itself.

The joystick works using limit 4 switches to represent the X and Y axis, in any direction — and pressing two limit switches simultaneously represents diagonal travel. The joystick is nice and responsive and weighty.

The buttons turned out to be very nice quality and definitely have that arcade feel. The white front buttons (for Start and Select) are slightly smaller than the others. That’s not very interesting, but I thought I’d mention it.

All hooked up and playing some Street Fighter 2!

Here’s one more photo of the finished Retrobox, still looking like a (not evil) robot, with two of my other Pi retro gaming Pi projects in the background — the Pi Cart and Gamepad Zero.

Here’s a photo of the Retrobox and I enjoying a celebratory beer together.

Be sure to watch the video for a full step-by-step tutorial if you want to build your own. This is a super easy, super fun project! Post below if you have any questions/comments and I’ll do my best to help you out. 🙂

Next, learn how to build your own AdventurePi, a portable arcade built into a photography hard case:

[[https://www.youtube.com/watch/UJyR60wn1Ec]]

Oftentimes when your battery dies it’s because the headlights (or some other-powered feature) were left on after the car was shut off. So if you’ve left the headlights or radio on overnight then it’s safe to say the battery is the problem. If you’re not sure, there are a few things you can check.

Turn on the headlights

Are they dim? If the headlights are bright, chances are your battery is fine. If they’re dim, it’s likely the battery doesn’t have enough charge to start the car.

Try to start the car

Obviously, you’ve tried this or you wouldn’t be worried about a dead battery. But when you tried, did it turn over slowly? Or did it crank quickly? If it turned over slowly or not at all, it’s likely that your battery is dead. If it cranked quickly it probably isn’t your battery.

Most of the time you won’t have an accessible battery jumper so you’ll need to find another vehicle that you can use to jump your car. If no friends or family members are available, ask a stranger for help—many will be happy to assist.

You’ll need to locate the battery in each of the cars. For most vehicles, the battery is located beneath the hood.

Use the hood release latch inside the vehicle to pop the vehicle hood. If you do not see the car battery after opening the hood, the battery might be under the back seat or in the trunk. Many foreign vehicles such as BMWs and Volvos locate the battery elsewhere.

You’ll want to locate the batteries first so you can make sure you position the cars so that the jumper cables can reach both batteries.

Connect the jumper cables in the following order:

• Connect one red clamp to the positive terminal (+) of the dead battery
• Connect the other red clamp to the positive terminal (+) of the charged battery
• Connect one black clamp to the negative terminal (-) of the charged battery
• Connect the other black clamp to a piece of grounded metal, or as a last resort the negative terminal (-) on the dead battery

Start the vehicle that will be providing a charge to the dead battery.

If your disabled vehicle doesn’t start immediately, leave the assisting vehicle running, with cables connected, for 5-10 minutes. This will charge your battery a bit before starting.

If your vehicle still doesn’t start, repeat this process and, before starting your car, have somebody rev the assisting car a bit by depressing the gas pedal slightly. This will temporarily send more current through the assisting vehicle’s alternator to its battery and, ultimately, your vehicle.

You can do this in the reverse order that they were attached, but it typically doesn’t matter.

Don’t immediately shut off the engine or the battery may not have had enough time to recharge. Sometimes you’ll need to keep the engine running for as long as 20 minutes. If you need to drive the vehicle, that should charge the battery faster as long as the alternator is working properly.

We’ll begin by printing the Raspberry Pi Zero frame. The frame will be used as a spacer and to provide the template for the GPIO pins.

The STL file can be found on Prusa’s website, but it takes a few steps to find it.

1. Go to the Prusa printable upgrades page
2. Download the STL files for the Original Prusa i3 MK3 (yes, even though there’s one labeled MK3S)
3. Unzip the folder
4. Open the folder, then navigate to Printed-Parts/stl
5. The file you’re looking for is called rpi-zero-frame.stl

Print settings

Slice and print the model using PrusaSlicer’s default settings for the MK3S:

• Layer height: 0.15mm
• First layer height: 0.2mm
• Infill density: 15%
• Infill type: Rectilinear
• Adhesion type: Skirt
• Supports: No

As I mentioned in the introduction, this guide is written for printers that have the Einsy-case with the removable back. When looking at the case, you’ll be able to see very clearly where to cut. Use a sharp knife or snips to cut away the removable piece.

Warnings

• Be extremely careful with this step!
• Unplug the printer!
• Do not cut the Einsy board!

Einsy-case without the removable back

If you’ve got the Einsy-case without the removable back, you can follow the disassembly instructions found here.

The GPIO header is what creates a connection from the Raspberry Pi to the Einsy board.

To prepare the GPIO header, we need to break away a 7×2 piece from the header strip. Then, using the Pi frame as a template, use needle-nose pliers to remove the pins that are not needed. Use the following image for further guidance.

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Breakaway Header Strip (19mm)

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Also, you should use the images in the next two steps to ensure you have the pins configured properly.

No soldering iron? No problem.

If you don’t have a soldering iron, purchase the Raspberry Pi Zero WH instead, which comes with a pre-soldered header. Then, use a pair of wire cutters to clip off the pins you don’t need. I recommend Hakko Miro Cutters because they’re awesome.

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Wire cutters

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Raspberry Pi Zero WH

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With the frame printed and header prepared, you’re ready to put the pieces together. Put the pins through the Pi frame, then connect to the Pi Zero. This step primarily exists to provide a picture of how everything should fit together.

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Raspberry Pi Zero W

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Use your helping hands to secure the Pi and keep the pins in place. Use your soldering iron to carefully solder the pins to the board. If you’re new to soldering, I recommend getting some practice in before attempting this process.

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Soldering Iron

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Next we’ll install OctoPrint. Specifically, we’re going to install an OctoPrint build created by Prusa that comes preconfigured for the MK3S. It’s called PrusaPrint. If you’d rather, you can also install the normal OctoPrint build, but it will require some additional configuration to get started.

Download links

• Download PrusaPrint
• Download OctoPrint

Installation instructions

For either build, you can follow our guide on how to install OctoPrint for more details. In short, you need to use a tool like Etcher to flash the disk image onto your Micro SD card.

We also made a YouTube video that details installation:

In order to use OctoPrint, we need to enable Wi-Fi. To do this, navigate to the root directly on the SD card. You can do this via the command line or using your file browser.

Open the file called octopi-wpa-supplicant.txt.

Uncomment the lines that look like this:

## WPA/WPA2 secured #network={ # ssid="put SSID here" # psk="put password here" #}

Add your network name (ssid) and password (psk). Then look for country configuration below. Uncomment your country (or add your country code if it doesn’t exist).

As an example, if you’re in the United States, you would uncomment:

# country=US

After making these two changes, save the file and exit. You should also eject the SD card at this time.

If you want to add a camera, now is the time. This step will breakdown everything required to mount a camera so you can monitor your prints.

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Raspberry Pi Camera

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Print the camera mount

I found an amazing camera mount on Thingiverse, but the print comes with a lot of files and is very customizable, so I’ll let you know exactly what I did.

Files and quantities

Printing advice

First, read the Thingiverse instructions. The author provides the proper print settings. The author recommends using 100% infill. I used 50% to save time, and it works just fine.

Also, the author says “no brim”. But I did, in fact, need a brim for some of the components. I identified these components in the table above.

You can try to print everything in a single batch, but I’d recommend breaking it up into multiple batches (so you don’t waste your time).

Assemble the camera mount

This part is fairly self-explanatory, and you can use the image as a guide. It’s like putting a puzzle together, and the good thing is that you get to assemble it exactly how you’d like. Go ahead and assemble the entire camera mount, and put the camera in position as well.

Using an M3x16 screw, secure the X Axis Bracket to the x-axis motor. This requires only one screw.

You can loosen thumb bolts and thumb nuts to reposition the mount, and tighten them to lock it in place.

Connect the camera

Connect one end of the camera ribbon cable to the Pi, and the other end to the camera. To do so, you’ll need to pull the tabs on both sides of the camera connector away. Then, slide the cable into the opening until it’s seated firmly in place. Then push the tabs back down to lock the cable in place.

If you look at the ends of the ribbon cable, you’ll notice one side has the “teeth” exposed. This is the side that makes the connection, and it should face the board on both the camera and the Pi.

A note on the camera cable

Most of the Raspberry Pi Zero camera cables you’ll find are too short for this project, so I recommend getting both the extender thingy and the extension cable as well.

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Raspberry Pi Camera Ribbon Cable (200cm)

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Adafruit Cable Extender Thingy

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Now, with the SD card inserted in the Pi Zero, attach the Pi directly to the Einsy board. Before doing so, find the female pin connectors on the Einsy board. Carefully align the male (from the Pi) and female connectors. If aligned correctly, this should not require much force.

Now, you can plug in and turn on the MK3S. Then, to enable the Raspberry Pi connection, use the controller to go to Settings then find RPi port, and toggle the value to on.

With the Raspberry Pi attached and the connection enabled, wait a few minutes. Then open a browser and visit http://octopi.local.

You’ll be guided through a setup process, which should only take a few minutes. At this point, you’ll have the opportunity to set your OctoPrint username and password.

From here, you can upload your gcode files and start your print remotely! After I set this up, I was pleasantly surprised with how well integrated OctoPrint is with the MK3S. The printer is very responsive to instructions from OctoPrint, which has not always been my experience with other printers.

At this point, you’ve successfully set up OctoPrint on your Prusa i3 MK3S. You’re ready to start printing!

Check out more great OctoPrint guides to get ideas for your next project.

Do this by swiping up from the bottom edge of the screen and releasing quickly. If you’re using a non-full screen model, hold your finger against the home button, which will bring you to the main menu of your phone.

Find the app on your phone that you want to delete.

I have everything organized on my phone under menus which helps me maintain peace of mind when I’m actually on my phone.

Once you have your app in sight, hold your finger against the screen for exactly one second. This will activate the 3D touch menu which gives quick access for app options.

Different apps have different menus depending on the app type, but they’ll all have the same basic layout.

The option to Delete App will be at the bottom of every menu, regardless of app type. It will also be written in red.

Select this option by pressing it, which will prompt a pop-up screen that gives you the option to either delete the app or cancel.

What’s next? You guessed it! Select delete by tapping the Delete button which removes the app from your phone’s immediate memory.

This action will not affect deleting data in your iCloud, which means any data that you’ve allowed your iCloud to backup will be preserved there.

And voila! You can enjoy your phone with one less app cluttering your memory or home screen space.

Happy deleting!