TinyTVs Offer a Bitesize Raspberry Pi Dose of Television

TinyCircuits TinyTV 2 and TinyTV Mini — (Image credit: TinyCircuits)

TinyCircuits, creators of Thumby, a thumb-sized Nintendo Game Boy, are back making another tiny device, this time a revision to its popular TinyTV.

TinyTV 2 and TinyTV mini are tiny displays powered by the Raspberry Pi Pico's RP2040, which can playback videos stored in the internal memory or stream video over a USB connection.

TinyTV 2 and Tiny TV Mini replicate the mid-20th century television aesthetic, but inside, they are powered by Raspberry Pi's powerful RP2040 microcontroller. Both units offer around 8GB of internal storage, which TinyCircuit claims will provide around 10 hours of playback for TinyTV 2 and a whopping 40 hours of video for TinyTV Mini

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TinyTV 2 and Tiny TV Mini Specifications
Row 0 - Cell 0	TinyTV 2	Tiny TV Mini
Processor	Raspberry Pi RP2040 Processor	Raspberry Pi RP2040 Processor
Display	IPS TFT 65K Color, 26mm (1.0 inch), 216x135 pixels	65K Color OLED, 15.2mm (0.6 inch), 64x64 pixels
Battery	Li-Polymer 3.7V, 150mAh, about 2 hours of video playback	Li-Polymer 3.7V, 50mAh, about 1 hour of video playback
Storage	Built in 8GB, about 10 hours of video playback	Built in 8GB, about 40 hours of video playback
Audio	16x9mm (0.6" x 0.4") front facing speaker	Internal speaker
Inputs	Power Button, 2 rotary knobs for channel and volume control	Power Button, Volume button, Channel button on the top of the unit
Remote	Can be controlled by an Infrared (IR) remote control	Can be controlled by an Infrared (IR) remote control
Connectivity	USB-C for uploading and battery charging	USB-C for uploading and battery charging
Dimensions	47.6 x 36.6 x 25.9mm (1.9 x 1.4 x 1.0 inches)	26.3 x 23.8 x 21.9mm (1.0 x 0.94 x 0.86 inches)

Each of the televisions comes pre-built inside of an injection molded plastic case. The televisions come pre-loaded with a selection of videos ready to watch. Just turn the dial and select the next "channel"; in reality, it skips to the next video. Another rotary dial provides volume control for the built-in speaker.

You'll want to load your own videos onto the units, and rather than spend countless hours tweaking Handbrake, TinyCircuits provides a video conversion tool. The conversion tool ensures that your videos are optimized and play with TinyTV.

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Les Pounder is an associate editor at Tom's Hardware. He is a creative technologist and for seven years has created projects to educate and inspire minds both young and old. He has worked with the Raspberry Pi Foundation to write and deliver their teacher training program "Picademy".