DIY Stream Deck Checks All the Boxes
With Elgato Stream Decks in short supply, Alex at Super Make Something has an excellent alternative.
As noted by Alex of Super Make Something, Elgato Stream Decks are a vital tool for anyone looking to livestream online, but the ongoing pandemic has made these handy devices either difficult to find or afford. These ingenious units feature a number of buttons and programmable icons to let you easily switch between different settings. As an alternative, Alex's DIY version can be made for just over $50.
This price, of course, assumes you have a 3D printer and soldering iron already, but the build is designed with the goal of being simple to make, even by someone without electronics experience. The heart of the Stream Deck is an Arduino Pro Micro which interfaces with the PC, along with an Arduino Nano that’s added on for supplemental IO. Each is situated on a motherboard, with a 3.5” LCD screen above for icon display, and a button board on top of that. Icons are stored on a microSD card, and can be modified as needed.
The six on-screen buttons are cleverly divided up via windows on the button board, which shine through 20x20 acrylic panels. Each of these presses down on four mechanical push buttons that are wired in parallel, activating a particular icon when pressed. The deck is also equipped with dual encoders, which could be useful for editing tasks. While the number of icons available is fewer than its commercial counterpart, this one looks like a lot of fun to assemble, is cheaper (and available), and adds the encoders that aren’t otherwise included!