Turn Your Cardputer Into a Dual-Screen Cyberdeck for $50

M5Stack’s Cardputers are some of the hottest devices in the hardware hacking community these days. With their physical keyboards and built-in displays, these pocketable little devices have the look and feel of an early 2000s PDA that is impossible to resist. Combined with an ESP32-S3 microcontroller that is meant for hacking, the Cardputer is one of the coolest mobile development platforms around.

However, 2000s-style PDAs aren’t around anymore for a reason. The idea of a dedicated, distraction-free device sounds great, and the nostalgia factor puts it over the top — but working with that tiny included display gets old before long. Even so, YouTuber Talking Sasquach saw the potential in this device, so he built a very capable cyberdeck out of it. The mod only costs about $50, and it’s pretty easy to replicate.

Specifically, the project is built around the M5Stack Cardputer ADV version, which serves as the primary computing platform. To expand the usable screen space, Talking Sasquach paired it with an inexpensive 2.8-inch ILI9341-based touchscreen display. Combined with a custom-designed 3D-printed enclosure, the Cardputer was transformed into a compact dual-screen cyberdeck resembling a miniature laptop while retaining the portability that makes the Cardputer so appealing.

Because the off-the-shelf display module includes a large PCB border, the creator trimmed away excess fiberglass using a rotary tool to fit the display into the custom enclosure. Standard DuPont jumper wires were then converted into a tidy wiring harness by gluing them together with cyanoacrylate adhesive and an activator spray. The Cardputer required only minimal disassembly, with the stock rear housing removed and replaced by a custom printed backplate that accommodates the new design. Once the modified display was installed into its upper shell, the two halves were joined with a simple screw-based hinge mechanism.

Talking Sasquach used Visual Studio Code and PlatformIO to develop a custom dual-screen version of PORKCHOP, a popular cybersecurity and network analysis framework. AI-generated test code helped identify the correct display configuration, and additional troubleshooting assistance quickly resolved compilation issues that initially blocked progress.

Early versions of the software simply mirrored the Cardputer’s built-in display onto the larger screen, but later revisions split the interface across both displays. Menus and controls remained on the Cardputer while visualizations occupied the secondary screen. To make better use of the additional space, Talking Sasquach added animated themes including Matrix-style digital rain, network monitoring graphics, wireless channel analyzers, and Vaporwave-inspired driving scenes and starfield effects.

The entire hardware modification, firmware customization, debugging process, and interface redesign were completed in a single evening. With publicly available source code and 3D-printable files, you can have your own Cardputer laptop in a jiffy as well.