While most of us are looking for handheld emulators that can cope with PS2, GameCube, and Dreamcast emulation, there’s one handheld that is specifically looking back to the dawn of home gaming and championing those early titles that pioneered the way.
We discovered the PicoZX over on Geeky Gadgets, a handheld emulator designed purely with the ZX Spectrum in mind.
Some of you might not even know what the ZX spectrum, never mind remember it. It’s a console designed by Sir Clive Sinclair that was released in 1982, one that is widely regarded as one of the most influential machines in home gaming and the British video gaming scene.
I’ve played on one many times over the years, but it came out 8 years before I was born, so it was never a console that I played religiously as a child. The N64 was my first-ever console and that was already miles ahead, and now that we’re in the age of the PS5, many people might look at the ZX Spectrum and think it’s some kind of spy device.
That’s why this emulator designed by Slovakian modder Bobricius is so important, a handheld that helps to keep the work of Sinclair alive for new generations, just like MAME and other collectives that champion the years of gaming past.
Ok, so I might have sounded a bit like a philosophical Mandalorian in my first paragraph, but the PicoZX can actually emulate other consoles as well as the Spectrum. So you could be firing up Magnavox Odyssey titles and making the ultimate Golden Age of Gaming handheld with your bare hands.
That’s true power, right there.
A Hands-on Handheld For True Enthusiasts
Some people say that anything worth having is never easy, and that might be the case for the PicoZX. It’s powered by Raspberry Pi Pico, just like the FlippyDrive that we covered a little while ago.
The PicoZX takes a little more work to put together, however, with users being required to build the handheld in either a full variant with all the extra bells and whistles or a streamlined, simpler version.
You can buy a pre-made version of the Pico ZX for around $200, but with so much emphasis on building this kit yourself, it seems to make sense for those with nimble fingers and a mind for crafting to opt for creating the handheld by hand and save some money in the process.
Completed, the Pico ZX will have a 2.8″ display, a micro SD card slot, and an 18650 lithium-ion battery to keep your handheld emulator running for hours. It’s a true passion project for fans of the ZX Spectrum, but one that will be incredibly rewarding and that’ll teach you about emulation and how handhelds operate at the same time.
Seeing The Bigger Picture
While the screen on the handheld is small, the PicoZX handheld emulator comes with a VGA output for you to hook it up to a bigger screen, giving you the option to see things on a bigger scale.
Don’t imagine that you’re going to be sticking this on your 82″ 4K TV and making it look great, however. You’ll be better suited using a Sony Trinitron or some of the other CRT TVs I have recommended over the years.
The full version of the PicoZX comes with the option of USB connectivity too, so effectively you can use this handheld as an emulation console and hook up external controllers as well. In essence, this provides a modern-day equivalent to the ZX Spectrum, one that might have well been Sinclair’s version of the Nintendo Switch back in the day if the technology had existed.
Head over to Tindie to pick and choose your components bundle, buy a pre-made unit, and for more information!
