![]() Although I ended up 3D printing this for convenience, it could just as easily be laser-cut for a nicer finish. The faceplate is a flat piece of 0.050″ plastic. It also accommodates the microcontroller with enough room for the backs of the switches and the requisite wiring. The base is a rounded rectangle that curves up to angle the buttons at 20° for easier viewing. ![]() The final design is in two parts with a base and a faceplate. It also keeps the footprint small on my desk. Eight switches seems like just enough to accomplish what I need it to without getting exorbitant. I chose a two-row design, each with four buttons for a total of eight hotkeys. This meant that I had a lot of freedom for designing the case so long as I avoided overhangs. The obvious tool of choice for building this was a 3D printer: fast, cheap, and with minimal design constraints. This is perfect, since most of what I need this device to control is OBS, which already has a great built-in hotkey manager. Fortunately though, I can replace the fancy USB communication with hotkeys from an off-the-shelf keyboard library and an Arduino. Much of the power of the Stream Deck is in the bundled software, and I’m not going to spend the time to develop a complete software package to replicate everything. When I say “basic” functionality, I do mean basic. The fancy ARM processor is going to be replaced with a dirt-cheap AVR, the touch-matrix keys are going to be replaced by basic mechanical switches, and the customizable RGB icons are going to be swapped out for relegendable keycaps. I wanted to make something that people could reasonably build at home, at a much lower cost than an off-the-shelf Stream Deck. There was a lot of engineering that went into making the Stream Deck, and I’m going to have to simplify. The #1 rule for this is cheap. The buttons on top allow the LCD to shine through for the backlight icons, and push down on a touch matrix to trigger button presses. Adafruit did an interesting breakdown on stream, but it’s essentially a mini computer using an Atmel ARM926EJ-S driving a 480×272 resolution LCD. The Stream Deck itself is a fantastic piece of tech. It could be used as a hotkey board for any program. Fortunately I think I can make something that replicates the basic functionality for a fraction of that price: what I’m calling a “Stream Cheap”.Īlthough I’m focusing on using this as a replacement for a Stream Deck, at heart this is really a custom macro keyboard. Unfortunately the Stream Deck is out of my price range, at a whopping $149.99 retail. By configuring the bundled software, users can set button icons and macros to control your casting software, send messages in the stream chat, launch programs, and much much more. ![]() The Stream Deck is a small device with 15 buttons, each of which has its own customizable RGB icon. ![]() I’ve been doing a little streaming on Twitch, and a lot of streamers I follow have something called an Elgato Stream Deck. ![]()
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