this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2026
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Not quite just a transistor but maybe something like this (an SOC with 32MB ram which costs about $5 in bulk) though it does require quite a bit of additional electronics to work.
Also somebody also made an embedded Linux for the ESP32-S3 (which is even cheaper and doesn't require anywhere as much auxiliary electronics).
PS: Yeah, I got the joke. Just pointing out that the reality itself is quite impressive.
Some crazy fucker got the OG Tomb Raider to run on an ESP chip.
Although the ESP is significantly more powerful than the original console.
Tomb Raider... not Doom, I'm shocked
Well, the full realtime 3D aspect does make it significantly more impressive
I think someone already did that one
figures
https://dmitry.gr/?r=05.Projects&proj=07.+Linux+on+8bit
This guy ran linux on 8-bit microcontroller by emulating a hogher end processor on an 8 bit computer. He also emulated the ram on an SD card.
Slow as heck, but can be done.
funny thing - the SDRAM used provides 300kb/sec, while the SDcard used as storage provides 200kb/sec. Performancewise they could just skip most of the ram outside of booting and use the SDcard without losing much performance, especially since the SDRAM needs to be refreshed every 62ms for a duration of 3ms regardless of use.
Edit: I LOVE this part:
6 hours to get into X is ridiculous- and i misread - it takes 6 hours to boot , and then hours more to get an X server running lol
Ok, but with emulation and enough time, you can run any software on as much as a light switch.
Yes, as long as you have enough memory. That's the point.
There are some not practical, but workable as proof of concept examples that go even lower:
https://hackaday.com/2012/03/28/building-the-worst-linux-pc-ever/
88 pins, that's way too many!
Is there a 32 pin DIP-32 chip that can run Linux?
Well, as two people already pointed out, turns out somebody got Linux to run on the 8-bit ATMega1284p microcontroller which comes in a DIP package, though it's 44 pin rather than 32.
>Not quite
>has about 1.5 million gates in the CPU alone
>each gate is multiple transistors