Hey everyone! I'm new here and wanted to introduce myself. I am an electrical engineer, a firmware programmer, and a Pythonista. I am fascinated by the new hardware mods coming out for the Switch, not because I want to run pirated games, but because the modchips being made right now are legitimately so cool to me from a technical perspective.
I use microcontrollers frequently, ranging from using an Arduino Uno programmed using the Arduino ecosystem to using a bare PIC programmed with a PICkit 3 and raw C. I've even made a few in-house dev boards for various companies I've worked for, but they always focused on "how many more useful things can we cram on this board", which is a trend that is mirrored in the "real" dev boards like Adafruit and Arduino sells.
I loved the idea of those Trinket clones that had removed LITERALLY EVERYTHING but the bare minimum to run the chip and solder wires to. No USB connector, no onboard DotStar, no bulky through-hole pads, not even a reset button. This is appealing to me because it means I am able to install those devices somewhere else in my project and then just run wires as I see fit. This is really useful for stuff like Circuit Bending, where you also have limited space, limited mounting spots, and mostly just loose wires flying around.
I didn't like the design of the Rebug SwitchME M0 (not great electrical engineering practices, unhelpful pinout, overly-large). While the RCMx86 might be a good board for me to use for circuit bending, all the ones I see people getting are knockoffs, and even if I got a genuine one, I would have to do some reverse engineering to get it programmable in Arduino.
So, I'm making my own microscopic stripped-down Trinket M0 dev board, named the Nimbug M0. It looks similar to a miniature RCMx86, but it's firmware-compatible with the Rebug SwitchME M0. It has its own well-defined Arduino board definitions that let you program it yourself. It also comes with a customized UF2 bootloader, so you also have the option of flashing pre-made .uf2 files.
I can't post links or anything because I am still a new member, but I plan on sharing when I can!
Pre-Fabrication Renders
Dimensions (mm) & Layers
Schematic
I use microcontrollers frequently, ranging from using an Arduino Uno programmed using the Arduino ecosystem to using a bare PIC programmed with a PICkit 3 and raw C. I've even made a few in-house dev boards for various companies I've worked for, but they always focused on "how many more useful things can we cram on this board", which is a trend that is mirrored in the "real" dev boards like Adafruit and Arduino sells.
I loved the idea of those Trinket clones that had removed LITERALLY EVERYTHING but the bare minimum to run the chip and solder wires to. No USB connector, no onboard DotStar, no bulky through-hole pads, not even a reset button. This is appealing to me because it means I am able to install those devices somewhere else in my project and then just run wires as I see fit. This is really useful for stuff like Circuit Bending, where you also have limited space, limited mounting spots, and mostly just loose wires flying around.
I didn't like the design of the Rebug SwitchME M0 (not great electrical engineering practices, unhelpful pinout, overly-large). While the RCMx86 might be a good board for me to use for circuit bending, all the ones I see people getting are knockoffs, and even if I got a genuine one, I would have to do some reverse engineering to get it programmable in Arduino.
So, I'm making my own microscopic stripped-down Trinket M0 dev board, named the Nimbug M0. It looks similar to a miniature RCMx86, but it's firmware-compatible with the Rebug SwitchME M0. It has its own well-defined Arduino board definitions that let you program it yourself. It also comes with a customized UF2 bootloader, so you also have the option of flashing pre-made .uf2 files.
I can't post links or anything because I am still a new member, but I plan on sharing when I can!
Pre-Fabrication Renders
Dimensions (mm) & Layers
Schematic
Last edited by nimaid,
