This Vintage Bush TV/Radio/Alarm Now Plays Host to a Raspberry Pi as a Retro-Futuristic Cyberdeck

Pseudonymous maker "Castletorch" has turned an old portable TV, radio, and alarm clock system into a surprisingly powerful cyberdeck — powered by a Raspberry Pi and offering a retro aesthetic through clever reuse and coloring of the original cathode ray tube (CRT) display.

Castletorch's creation is built around a TV-clock-radio aimed at bedside use. Where its internals originally included a UHF analog TV tuner, grayscale CRT display, and LW/MW/VHF radio, though, the repurposed chassis now plays host to a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B single-board computer — but fed through the original display, now disguised behind an amber gel for a retro-futuristic aesthetic inspired by vintage VDU accessories.

"I didn't want to damage this TV, and as such ended up making no permanent modifications to it; hell, all the original functions still work as-is, so all I've really done is made it even more useful," Castletorch explains. "I just crammed an old RF modulator into it and fed it with composite from the Pi.

"Problem is, the Pi's TRRS [Tip-Ring-Ring-Sleeve] pin-out doesn't match the pin-out of any of my TRRS-to-RCA cables (because apparently it was never standardized? [It] also took ages to find the TRRS pinout for the Pi because I just kept getting results for the GPIO [General-Purpose Input/Output] connector). In the end, I just ripped some old RGB ports from the back of a TV's logic board and used that as a way to 'remap' the pins to the right places. Either way, eventually got an RF signal internally and just ran that around to the antenna connector so I can quickly disconnect the Pi and connect a different device to it (you can see the cable sticking out on the right)."

In addition to being able to use all the original functions of the portable — even the alarm clock works — Castletorch's enhanced edition is a fully-functional computer with compact yet readable display. Network connectivity is handled via Wi-Fi, while an external keyboard and trackpad accessory connects over Bluetooth with no need to run any cables.

There's work still be to done, mind you. "On top of simplifying the video solution, I do want to customize it a bit further with a few custom decals to cover up the existing silkscreen," Castletorch explains, "[as well as] simplifying the power setup so it can be run from a single 12V adapter — right now it's using a messy combo of 240V and 5V — and also wire up some of the switches, buttons, and dials to the GPIO header so I can repurpose them."

More details are available on Castletorch's Reddit thread.