Nintendo Game Boy Modded to Mine Bitcoin

[AleksandarK]

Nintendo's Game Boy handheld console was launched in 1989, making it 32 years old. Being widely regarded as the icon of handheld gaming, it was sold in millions and has been copied countless times. However, with some spare time and a crazy mind, the console has been modified to mine Bitcoin cryptocurrency. Yes, you are reading that right. An 8-bit console is mining the biggest and the most valuable cryptocurrency. An electronics enthusiast named "stacksmashing" has set himself a difficult task - to prove that the console can mine some Bitcoin, at any possible rate. And he has managed to prove it is possible, although with some modifications.

Given that the console lacks any connectivity options to the outside world due to its age, the modder had to use SPI (Serial Peripheral Interface) to connect the Game Boy with the Raspberry Pi, which had the task of connecting the Game Boy to the internet to mine some Bitcoin. Using the custom 8-bit Sharp LR35902 processor running at 4.19 MHz, the console is naturally not very powerful. Thus, it can not do any meaningful mining and to compare it to modern mining ASICs is just silly. However, it is interesting to see proof of concept and get to see some engineering fun. For more information, please check out the YouTube video here.


View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[PLAfiller]

Are you kiddin me? PCs, mobile phones (andoid devices? tablets?), websites, gameboy...what's next? Symbian OS phones? MP3 players?

 

[ZoneDymo]

Are you kiddin me? PCs, mobile phones (andoid devices? tablets?), websites, gameboy...what's next? Symbian OS phones? MP3 players?

tamagotchi and furby and of course the trapper keeper and fidget spinners, alllll farming that sweet sweet crypto

 

[TumbleGeorge]

Are you kiddin me? PCs, mobile phones (andoid devices? tablets?), websites, gameboy...what's next? Symbian OS phones? MP3 players?

Your nuts

 

[Post Nut Clairvoyance]

This is very stupid and also very awesome.
makes me visualize a world where every kid had a Gameboy with cellular net circuit, and everyone multiplayer's classic Gameboy games.
ofc in our world this would require going back and reprogram all the GB games and add the hardware. so not worth doing. and im not looking for Nintendo switch running emulator either. There's just a charm to retro colored plastique chassis, simple controls and games that express creativity all the while "make do" with the hardware it runs on.

 

[Fabio Bologna]

Next up is an actual powerdrill modded to mine crypto XD

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

No, next up will prolly be a fitbit watch...

 

[Caring1]

The CPU in your car's computer or a pacemaker.

 

[Kohl Baas]

Next up is an actual powerdrill modded to mine crypto XD

Here are the brand new CryproCrusher! The jackhammer that can mine without any help or supervision!

 

[watzupken]

Interesting proof of concept which I believe the person that did it also put in quite a lot of effort, but its meaningless. You want to proof something works for a meaningful purpose, and while it proofs you can mine with a Game Boy, you will need like a lot of units to match the mining performance on a low end GPU.

 

[R0H1T]

Your nuts

You don't really mean that, or do you

 

[Caring1]

Your nuts

You're nuts

 

[Outback Bronze]

Ill have to try my Sega Mega Drive.

 

[_JP_]

Time to mod my S-V.P.A.M. to mine bitcoin now, too!

 

[voltage]

and what, it takes 100 years to get 1 percent of one.

 

[_JP_]

and what, it takes 100 years to get 1 percent of one.

If it's connected to the 5V charger though solar power, with ~2Ah battteries. Otherwise it might fail mid-way.

 

[Mad_foxx1983]

when the retro community thought they were safe.

 

[loracle706]

Hashrate please ?, i think with this you'll get one bitcoin in a million years

 

[birdie]

Hashrate please ?, i think with this you'll get one bitcoin in a million years

and what, it takes 100 years to get 1 percent of one.

You'll never mine a single block with this device. Either you join a pool or you're bust.

This is more like a PoC that this device can calculate SHA256 hashes, that's it.

 

[qubit]

That's hardcore and the more pointless the better. I like it.

 

[Chris34]

Are you kiddin me? PCs, mobile phones (andoid devices? tablets?), websites, gameboy...what's next? Symbian OS phones? MP3 players?

Dildos.

 

[ExcuseMeWtf]

Are you kiddin me? PCs, mobile phones (andoid devices? tablets?), websites, gameboy...what's next? Symbian OS phones? MP3 players?

From the article:

Thus, it can not do any meaningful mining and to compare it to modern mining ASICs is just silly.

So meh, it's like playing Doom on a fridge...

 

[Caring1]

Dildos.

So inert pieces of silicon can be used to mine?
I thought it would at least have to be motorised.

 

[deu]

The CPU in your car's computer or a pacemaker.

I mean: no reason for your pacemaker to idle when you're not using it... ... Just install nicehash and lease the power to a chinese farm!; nothing *can/should go wrong!

Hashrate please ?, i think with this you'll get one bitcoin in a million years

Yeah right? Im sitting here with my newly restored gameboy thinking: if I could just make up some of the rent on this bad boy... We need to know the AA-battery/hashrate to know if we can earn money! /s

 

[chstamos]

and what, it takes 100 years to get 1 percent of one.

Try heat death of the universe .

I watched the video, and it's performing 1/125.000.000.000.000 of an asic miner. So this might actually be correct.

To put it differently, if every single person on earth, man woman and child, had 21.000 gameboys mining, each, the sum total would perform equally to one asic miner. Eh, if it scaled linearly, that is (no idea). Perhaps it would be even worse.

The earth will probably be engulfed by the expanding sun and burned to a crisp with everything on it, before a gameboy has mined a day's worth of an RX580 radeon gpu.

PS : Though to be honest, the gameboy may still keep ticking after the earth is engulfed by the expanding sun. Have you seen how indestructible these things are? It's crazy.