Silard Gal's VESA ESP Puts an Espressif ESP32-S3 on the Back of Any VESA-Compatible Display
Custom PCB for an Espressif microcontroller module makes it easy to drive VGA displays without taking up any desk space.
Hardware engineer Silard Gal has designed an Espressif ESP32-S3 microcontroller development board with a difference: the PCB includes a VGA video output and mounting points compatible with the VESA standard — meaning it can hang off the back of most monitors.
"The primary goal is to develop a microcontroller with VGA output — a notable achievement — that mounts on the back of monitors as a VESA-compatible device for a streamlined, space-saving design," Gal explains of the project. "For practicality, it’s designed to mount on the back of monitors using a plate PCB compatible with VESA holders, ensuring a space-efficient setup."
The project is based around the Espressif ESP32-S3 microcontroller, a device with two Tensilica Xtensa LX7 microcontroller cores running at up to 240MHz, 512kB of internal static RAM (SRAM), and 2.4GHz single-band IEEE 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 5 Low Energy (BLE) radios. What it doesn't normally include is a video output — but that didn't stop Gal.
Gal's project hinges on a library released by YouTuber Matthias "bitluni" Balwierz two years ago, which uses general-purpose input/output (GPIO) pins on the ESP32-S3 to drive a VGA output at resolutions up to 800×600 with a 60Hz refresh rate and a 16-bit color depth or as high as rising to 1280×720 with an eight-bit color depth.
For this, Gal has designed a custom development board in an unusual shape — to bring its mounting points in-line with those of the VESA monitor mounting standard, meaning the board can be attached to the back of any VESA-compatible display for a tidier desk. The first prototype has proven the concept — including making sure that monitor arms and mounts can still be used alongside the board — with a v1.1 revision planned to reduce costs through optimizing the bill of materials, add microcontroller flashing support over USB Type-C alongside power, and make the input connectors harder to connect incorrectly.
The project is documented on Hackaday.io; at the time of writing, no design files had yet been released.