My Simple TrimUI Brick Setup (MinUI Guide)

Last updated: 30JAN2025 (see Changelog for details)

I’ve really been enjoying the TrimUI Brick, and I spent a few days really fine-tuning its configuration to make it a simple, custom experience. This guide will show you all the steps I took and how you can set up something similar for yourself if you would like.

Note that in general, this guide can be used as a MinUI setup guide as well. MinUI is generally a very simple and intuitive experience, and I’m going to show you some special customizations you can try to really enhance and personalize your experience.

Table of Contents

Project goals
Set up the microSD card
Install MinUI
Add MinUI custom paks (optional)
Add BIOS files
Add game files
Game collections
Customize your systems
Create a custom boot logo
General MinUI tips
Adding PortMaster and WiFi
Box art Easter Egg
Add LED light control
Start fresh with Stock OS
Try out KNULLI

Changelog

Project goals

Let’s talk about what I’m trying to accomplish with this particular setup.

  • Light and simple. I want to keep my UI as clean as possible, while giving my access to my favorite core systems.
  • Focused on retro systems. Even though the TrimUI Brick is capable of some higher-end systems like N64, PSP, and Dreamcast, I want to hone in on systems I think excel the most with the Brick, which are games that don’t need any analog stick workarounds or those whose performance isn’t so demanding it makes the handheld heat up a bunch. So we’re going to stick with PS1 and below, plus Pico-8 and arcade games.
  • Offline gaming. Even though I love using Retro Achievements, and this device is capable of WiFi, I am setting it up as an offline console. My thinking is that because the handheld is so small and pocketable, you will most often be playing it while on the go, where WiFi connectivity feels like a complication that detracts from the gaming experience.

In the long run, if you are looking to get the most bang for your buck, then this setup isn’t for you. Stock OS or KNULLI will give you more options for other systems, and wonderful tools like PortMaster. This setup is meant to streamline and optimize the gaming experience so that you have fewer barriers to entry, while still having quick and easy access to many systems.

Set up the microSD card

Setting up the card for MinUI is super easy. If you are using a microSD card that is larger than 32GB, it is recommended you format it to FAT32. The TrimUI Brick will still function with the default exFAT file system, but I have found that it can create corruption issues, so it’s best to stick with FAT32.

If you are using a brand new SD card that is 32GB or smaller, you don’t have to do anything. If you are not using a brand new card, I recommend using SD Card Formatter to wipe the card beforehand, but after that you are good to go.

If you are using a card that is over 32GB in file size, here is how to format it to FAT32:

  • Windows: download and install Rufus on your PC. The standard “rufus-4.6.exe” (the number will likely change) is fine. Insert your card and open Rufus, then select your card from the drop-down menu. Set the “Boot selection” to “Non bootable”, and set “File system” to FAT32. Under “Volume label” you can name the card, then press START and follow the prompts.
  • Mac: Insert your card and open Disk Utility (it is pre-installed in MacOS). Select your microSD card, then select Erase. Give the card a name and under the “Format” option select “MS-DOS (FAT32)” and click Erase.

In general, I recommend the cards listed below, in order or preference. The prices fluctuate all the time, so keep an eye out for deals. If you are just going to play 8-bit and 16-bit era cartridge games, a 16GB or 32GB card will be plenty. A 128GB card will allow you to load EVERY 8-bit and 16-bit game out there, just about all of the arcade games that work, and quite a few PS1, TG-CD, and Sega CD games (those systems have the largest file sizes). A 256GB or 512GB card will allow you to store even more of those larger games, but is mostly overkill for a device like the TrimUI Brick. I personally use a 64GB or 128GB card.

As far as model (“Extreme” vs “Ultra”, etc), this won’t matter when it comes to playing games. Some cards may transfer files more quickly (like when adding ROMs to the card), but the difference will be negligible. Instead, shop around for the best deal based on your desired amount of storage!

If you need a microSD card reader to plug into your PC, this one from Anker has never done me wrong for $15, and I also love this more fancy version with USB-C and USB-A connections.

Install MinUI

Now that your card is ready, we can download and install the requisite MinUI files.

Go to the MinUI website and download the latest releases — both the BASE and EXTRAS zip files listed in the “Assets” section of the release. Unzip both zip files and place the extracted files into the root (base) directory of your microSD card as specified below:

  • With the BASE zip file, move over the following folders and files:
    • Bios (folder)
    • MinUI.zip
    • Roms (folder)
    • Saves (folder)
    • trimui (folder)
  • With the EXTRAS zip file, just move over everything (minus the readme file). You may get prompted to merge similar folders, just click yes if that happens.

Add MinUI custom paks (optional)

Adding these optional paks allow us to launch certain systems on MinUI that are not supported by the stock MinUI experience. These paks won’t receive official support, but are great if you want to run arcade games, native Pico-8, or maybe a few N64 and Dreamcast games.

  • Go to Ryan’s TrimUI Smart Pro Custom MinUI Paks GitHub page and download the latest release
  • Extract the zip file and then move all of its contents to the root of your microSD card. You may get prompted to merge similar folders, just click yes if that happens.

Thanks to tenlevels and ryanmsartor for putting this together!

Add BIOS files

Now that you have added MinUI’s BASE and EXTRAS folders, plus MinUI Custom Paks, we can start adding our game and BIOS files. Let’s start with BIOS files. These are necessary for certain systems to run properly, and have unique locations in MinUI. Here is a list of BIOS files and their locations within the MinUI file system. These BIOS files are case sensitive!

Note that like with ROM files, BIOS files are copyrighted, and you are on your own to source them.

Game Boy (boot logo): Bios > GB > gb_bios.bin
Game Boy Color (boot logo): Bios > GBC > gbc_bios.bin
Game Boy Advance (boot logo): Bios > GBA > gba_bios.bin
Sega CD: Bios > MD > bios_CD_E.bin, bios_CD_J.bin, and bios_CD_U.bin
Sony PlayStation: Bios > PS > psxonpsp660.bin
TurboGrafx CD: Bios > PCE > syscard3.pce
Famicom Disk System: Bios > FC > disksys.rom
Pokemon Mini: Bios > PKM > bios.min
Super Game Boy: Bios > sgb.bios
Neo Geo: place neogeo.zip in same folder as Neo Geo ROMs
Sega Dreamcast: Bios > dc > dc_boot.bin
Sega Naomi: Bios > dc > naomi.zip
Pico-8 (Native): Emus > tg3040 > PICO.pak > PICO8_Wrapper > bin > pico8.dat and pico8_64 from the paid Raspberry Pi version of the console

Add game files

Adding game files is mostly straightforward: add the game files to the corresponding Roms folder on your SD card. So for example, add your Game Boy ROMs to the Roms > Game Boy (GB) folder on your microSD card.

Some tips and tricks:

  • Only folders that have game files inside of them will appear in the MinUI menu, so it will have a nice clean experience.
  • If you add files to any folder and then decide you don’t want them to actually appear in the MinUI menu, rather than deleting the files, you can add a “.disabled” extension to the end of the folder and it won’t appear. For example, if you have a bunch of games added to Atari Lynx (LYNX), you can just rename that folder to “Atari Lynx (LYNX).disabled” and it won’t show up in the menu. This can be especially handy if you want to have games appear in a Collection but not in the main menu.
  • There are two Pico-8 ROM folders available, the one named “P8” uses the Fake08 emulator, and the “PICO” folder is using the native app wrapper. I recommend the PICO option, which has better compatibility.
  • You can change the name of each folder to whatever you would like, as long as you keep the emulator association (in parenthesis) at the end of the folder name. So you could make a folder named either Sega Genesis (MD) or Sega Mega Drive (MD), whatever you prefer.
  • If you want, you can make additional folders as long as they have the same emulator association in parenthesis at the end of the folder name. So you could have BOTH the Sega Genesis (MD) and Sega Mega Drive (MD) folders appear in the menu, if you wanted to separate your 16-bit Sega games by region.
  • You can also consolidate similar systems into the same folder, as long as they use the same emulator core. For example, you can add Sega CD and Sega 32X games into your Sega Genesis (MD) folder, and all three systems will launch from the same menu. This is handy because I think MinUI is best when it is simple, and having a single Sega Genesis folder is a lot cleaner than having three total folders to scroll through. Another example is my preferred arcade setup, which I lump together with Neo Geo since the main arcade core in this setup is FinalBurn Neo (which also supports Neo Geo). So I change my folder name to “Arcade and Neo Geo (FBN)”, and put both FinalBurn Neo arcade games and Neo Geo games together.
  • For arcade folders, you will want to add a map.txt file into the ROM folder to ensure that the full arcade name is displayed. The MinUI custom paks will already contain that within the FBNeo folder, but here is a direct link if you need it.
  • By default, the folders will appear in alphabetical order in MinUI, but you can customize the order by adding a number and closed parens (like “1)” and so on) at the start of the title. Here is a sample order that is not alphabetical, but actually grouped by manufacturer, release date, and console type:

0) Arcade and Neo Geo (FBN)
1) Game Boy (GB)
2) Game Boy Color (GBC)
3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)
4) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)
5) Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SFC)
6) Sega Genesis (MD)
…and so on.

Note that if you are going to have more than 10 systems (0 through 9), then you need to use a leading zero to accommodate double digits:

00) Arcade and Neo Geo (FBN)
01) Game Boy (GB)
02) Game Boy Color (GBC)
03) Game Boy Advance (GBA)
04) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)
05) Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SFC)
06) Sega Genesis (MD)
…and so on.

Game collections

MinUI supports Collections, which are simple and customizable text files.

To get started, created a folder named “Collections” in the root directory of your microSD card. Inside your Collections folder, add a txt file and name it whatever you would like. Open the txt file with a text editor like Notepad, and simply make a list of games and their paths. Here is an example of “Castlevanias.txt” from my collection:

/Roms/4) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)/Castlevania (USA) (Rev A).nes
/Roms/4) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)/Castlevania II – Simon’s Quest (USA).nes
/Roms/4) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)/Castlevania III – Dracula’s Curse (USA).nes
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Castlevania – The Adventure (USA) (Castlevania Anniversary Collection).gb
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Castlevania II – Belmont’s Revenge (USA, Europe).gb
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Kid Dracula (Restored).gb
/Roms/5) Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SFC)/Super Castlevania IV (USA).sfc
/Roms/3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)/Castlevania – Aria of Sorrow (USA).gba
/Roms/3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)/Castlevania – Harmony of Dissonance (USA).gba
/Roms/7) TurboGrafx-16 (PCE)/Castlevania – Rondo of Blood (Japan) [T-En by Burnt Lasagna & Cubanraul v1.01] [n].chd
/Roms/8) Sony PlayStation (PS)/Castlevania – Symphony of the Night (QoL v1.2).chd

So you can see in this collection I have added the games in a mix of release and system order, starting with NES and going from there. I also added Kid Dracula since it feels like a spiritual successor to some of the older Castlevania games.

Some tricks and tips:

  • If you make any changes to the game or directory names, it will break the connection. For example, if you change the number order of your ROM folders, you’ll have to change their path in each of your Collections too.
  • You can add hidden games to your Collections, so that they only appear in the Collection and not in the main menu. Let’s say that I don’t want Nintendo DS games to show up in my main menu, but I want to add a certain NDS game to a collection, like Final Fantasy III. I can hide the Nintendo DS folder by adding a “.disabled” extension to the folder name, and then add that full folder name to my collection, like this (in bold to make it easier to find):

/Roms/4) Nintendo Entertainment System (FC)/Final Fantasy (USA).nes
/Roms/3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)/Final Fantasy I & II – Dawn of Souls (Rebalanced).gba
/Roms/Nintendo DS (NDS).disabled/Final Fantasy III (USA).nds
/Roms/3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)/Final Fantasy IV Advance (Restored).gba
/Roms/3) Game Boy Advance (GBA)/Final Fantasy V Advance (USA).gba
/Roms/5) Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SFC)/Final Fantasy VI (TWUE 3.06) + Bug Fixes & Add-Ons.sfc
/Roms/8) Sony PlayStation (PS)/Final Fantasy VII.pbp
/Roms/8) Sony PlayStation (PS)/Final Fantasy VIII.pbp
/Roms/8) Sony PlayStation (PS)/Final Fantasy IX.pbp
/Roms/8) Sony PlayStation (PS)/Final Fantasy Tactics (USA).chd
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Final Fantasy Adventure (World) (Collection of Mana).gb
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Final Fantasy Legend (USA).gb
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Final Fantasy Legend II (USA).gb
/Roms/1) Game Boy (GB)/Final Fantasy Legend III (USA).gb

If you’d like some help in getting started, here is a zip file of my own MinUI Collections (right-click and select “Save As”). Bear in mind that the ROM file names may not match yours, but it will give you an idea of some favorites.

Customize your systems

Now that we have all of our games added and everything organized, now we can start to play our games. But there are a few customizations we can do to enhance our play experience as well.

Let’s use Game Boy as our example.

  • Start up a Game Boy game, then press the Menu button (to the left of the SELECT button on the TrimUI Brick).
  • Go to Options > Frontend, and choose the defaults for your system. They are already pre-configured by the MinUI developer, but you might want to adjust them yourself. For example, I prefer the following settings for GB:
    • Screen Scaling: Aspect
    • Screen Effect: Grid
    • Screen Sharpness: Crisp
    • CPU Speed: Powersave
    • Debug HUD: Off
    • Max FF Speed: 4x
  • Now, go to Options > Emulator. Here you can make more adjustments, like GB Colorization, Color Correction, and more. Note that if you have added the BIOS file, you can go to Use Official Bootloader and set it to Enabled so you can see the boot logo when starting GB games.
  • Next, under Options > Shortcuts, you can add hotkeys. Any spare button can be used (like the shoulder and trigger buttons, which didn’t exist on the GB), or you can press MENU + another button for a combo hotkey. These are the shortcuts I set for every system:
    • Save & Quit: MENU + START
    • Cycle Scaling: L3
    • Cycle Effect: R3
    • Toggle FF: R2
  • This means that I can press the two front function keys (considered L3 and R3 in MinUI) to cycle between aspect ratio and grid/scanline effects. Also any time I press R2 I can toggle ON/OFF fast forward, and if I press MENU + START it will save and exit my game.
  • Once you are done with adjusting the settings for your system, go to Options > Save Changes > Save for console. Now every Game Boy game will follow these same configurations.
  • Go through each of the other systems and also set them up accordingly: your preferred scaling and CPU speed, any Emulator-specific settings, and your shortcuts; then just select “Save for console” and move on to the next one. This is a little tedious, but only has to be done once.

The EXTRAS file from MinUI contains a Boot logo tool; if you go into Tools and run the Bootlogo tool, by default it will replace the TrimUI boot logo with a MinUI boot logo. But the cool thing is you can just make your own image and boot that instead.

  • Put the microSD card in your computer, then go to Tools > tg3040 > Bootlogo.pak. Inside you will see a file named bootlogo.bmp. Using a photo editing app like Photoshop or GIMP, make a small bmp file. I recommend something around 500×500 or less, and with a black background so it blends into the rest of the screen.
  • Once you have your new file, name it bootlogo.bmp and replace the file you found in the Tools > tg3040 > Bootlogo.pak folder.
  • Here is a boot logo that I made using the typical RGC fond and color scheme: to download, right-click on this link and select “save as…” and then replace the bootlogo.bmp file you found in the Tools > tg3040 > Bootlogo.pak folder.

Note that after you run this tool, it will “self-destruct” and not appear again. To make it re-appear (like if you want to run the tool again with a new image), put the card back into your PC and go to Tools > tg3040 > Bootlogo.pak.disabled and remove the “.disabled” portion of the folder name.

In addition to the Bootlogo tool, you will find a tool named “Remove loading” in the Tools menu. This will remove the TrimUI “loading screen” when launching the system, so you can run this one time to have a cleaner experience.

General MinUI tips

When actually using MinUI, here are some handy tips and tricks:

  • Any time you are playing a game, you can press and hold the POWER button to create a Quicksave, and then next time you turn on the device it will resume where you were mid-game.
  • Tap the POWER button to put the device to sleep. After a few minutes the device will auto-shutdown to conserve battery life. If you are in the middle of a game when you put it to sleep, it will save your game before powering off.
  • If you don’t press anything for 30 seconds, MinUI will automatically put your device to sleep. Tap the POWER button to resume from sleep.
  • If you want to start up a game from the menu that you’ve already made a save for, you can press the X button instead of A to launch the game and your save file at the same time. Otherwise, you can press A to start the game over from the beginning, or press the MENU button while in the game to load your last save state.
  • To adjust brightness, press and hold the MENU button, then press Volume Up or Down.
  • The toggle switch on the right side of the device is a MUTE toggle, if you toggle it down it will mute the game, and toggling it up will restore the audio.

Adding PortMaster and WiFi

MinUI is simple by design, but with the help of the custom MinUI paks detailed above, you can add some other core functionality to the platform.

Adding WiFi:

WiFi will already work in MinUI if you connected it previously with your Stock OS card (the WiFi information is stored on the device, not the cards). So simply use the Stock card to connect, then switch back to your MinUI card. You’ll know it’s working when you see the WiFi symbol on the top-right of your MinUI interface. There are reports that leaving Bluetooth enabled on the Stock OS card can inhibit WiFi connectivity in MinUI, so turn that off with the Stock card if you experience any connection issues.

MinUI’s native emulator cores don’t support WiFi functions like Retro Achievements, but you can experiment with the MinUI Custom Paks to use RetroArch and log into Retro Achievements that way. This goes against the spirit of this guide but it’s definitely possible!

To disable WiFi, launch the Stock OS card again and disable it, then power off and switch back to your MinUI card.

Adding PortMaster:

Note that adding PortMaster to MinUI is contrary to the OS’s original design, and should only be attempted by tinkerers.

First, make sure that you have added the MinUI Custom Paks as detailed in the section above, since that contains PortMaster. Next, go into the Tools > tg5040 folder and grab the Portmaster.pak, and copy that into your Tools > tg3040 folder.

To get PortMaster running properly, you need to install a special firmware known as TrimUI_EX, which was made by a PortMaster team member. You will need a spare microSD card to set it up, which you can discard once you have gone through this section. We are simply installing the firmware on a different card and then going back to our MinUI card.

Take a spare microSD card and format it to FAT32. Follow the instructions found here, but use the firmware found on this page instead of the TrimUI Smart Pro firmware detailed in that guide. Note that there is always a risk of bricking your device with any firmware flash, so be sure to follow those instructions carefully. Once you are done with that process, you can turn off your device and discard that FAT32 TrimUI_EX card.

Back on your original MinUI card, you will need to “reinstall” the OS by adding the “trimui” folder and “MinUI.zip” file from the most recent official base version of MinUI to the root directory of your card. This will prompt MinUI to update itself upon first boot. Now you should have full access to MinUI as well as PortMaster.

The PortMaster app does not seem to work with WiFi, so you will likely need to install your games offline. Thankfully we can use PortMaster’s “autoinstall” tool to easily install games with minimal effort.

To install PortMaster games offline:

  • Download each of the Runtimes from this page, and place them in the Roms > Apps > PortMaster > PortMaster > libs folder of your microSD card.
  • Go to the PortMaster Games page, find the game that you want to add, then download the zip file. Place the zip file in the Roms > Apps > PortMaster > PortMaster > autoinstall folder of your microSD card.
  • Turn on your device, then go to Tools > PortMaster. As it starts, the app will auto install the zip files you added in the previous step, and place the Port folder to the Data > ports folder on your SD card, and your Ports SH file to the Roms > PORTS folder. PortMaster has a habit of crashing during the autoinstall process, simply re-start PortMaster to resume where you were.
  • You should now find the Port available in the Roms > Ports section of your MinUI device. Note that commercial ports require data files that are detailed on that game’s PortMaster page, so those will need to be added after running the auto install function. Generally, you will add the commercial files in the Roms > Ports > (name of port) > gamedata folder.

There are MANY Ports that will not boot on the TrimUI Brick right now, so definitely consider Ports to be an “added bonus” for the whole experience. Ports that I got working using the steps above: Apotris, Cannonball-st, Celeste, Freegemas, Panzer Paladin, Sonic Mania, and TMNT Shredder’s Revenge.

Box art Easter Egg

Yes, it is possible to add box art to MinUI (sort of). It’s not a supported feature on the OS, but something that was built into it at one point for the developer to make an easy navigation experience for children. Please note this is a labor-intensive process, and likely not great when using a single SD card between several different devices and resolutions. But if you are using your MinUI card on a single device, this could enhance your gameplay experience (and make it easier for non-readers to navigate).

Note that because this feature is unsupported, future updates to MinUI may break compatibility. You can read more about it here.

  • Within each ROM folder, create a folder named “.res” (with a dot in front of it). In Windows you will get a prompt to confirm you are making a hidden folder, and on Mac it won’t let you even make that folder until you press CMD + SHIFT + “.” (period) to reveal hidden files first.
  • Inside that folder, add PNG image files that correspond to the ROM file in the main ROM folder. This image file name needs to include the ROM’s file extension too. So for example, “Super Mario Bros 2.nes” will need an image named “Super Mario Bros 2.nes.png”.
  • Images will need to be manually resized to look good on your screen. For the TrimUI Brick, I would recommend a width of 300px for each square and vertical box art image, and 350px for wide images (like the SNES box art). For 480p displays (like the Miyoo Flip pictured above), I would recommend a width of 200px for square/vertical and 250px for wide images.

To acquire boxart, I would recommend grabbing the images from Libretro’s thumbnail repository, since they are already in PNG format. Just bear in mind that you will need to resize and rename each of them to match your ROMs. If the game you are looking for isn’t present in the Libretro repo, then searching TheGamesDB may yield more results, but bear in mind that these are usually JPG files that will need to be converted to PNG.

Box art even carries over to Game Collections automatically, so your box art will appear there. In addition, you can make a “.res” folder within the main ROMs folder if you want console/system art (i.e. Game Boy, NES, SNES etc console art) and you can do the same for custom collections art (Super Marios, Castlevanias, etc).

Add LED light control

By default, MinUI will turn off your TrimUI’s LED lights, but if you want to restore them, check out this LedControl app from developer ro9inmorgan.

To install, download the latest release and unzip/copy the LedControl.pak folder to the Apps folder of your card. You should then find the app in your Apps menu.

Start fresh with stock OS

If you would rather get back to the original stock OS experience, or if your device didn’t come with a stock OS card, here is how to set it up from scratch.

If you are using a brand new SD card that is 32GB or smaller, you don’t have to do anything. If you are not using a brand new card, I recommend using SD Card Formatter to wipe the card beforehand, but after that you are good to go.

If you are using a card that is over 32GB in file size, here is how to format it to FAT32:

Mac: Insert your card and open Disk Utility (it is pre-installed in MacOS). Select your microSD card, then select Erase. Give the card a name and under the “Format” option select “MS-DOS (FAT32)” and click Erase.

Windows: download and install Rufus on your PC. The standard “rufus-4.6.exe” (the number will likely change) is fine. Insert your card and open Rufus, then select your card from the drop-down menu. Set the “Boot selection” to “Non bootable”, and set “File system” to FAT32. Under “Volume label” you can name the card, then press START and follow the prompts.

Download the latest “SD base package” zip file from this page. Unzip the file and place everything in the root directory of your microSD card. From there, add your game files and you are back to a fresh stock experience.

Try out KNULLI

If you are looking for a different experience, KNULLI (forked from Batocera) has a working Pre-Alpha version of their OS for the TrimUI Brick. This is still a work in progress, but you can grab it from their releases page.

If you need help setting up KNULLI, check out their excellent website!


Changelog

30JAN2025
– added LedControl app section

14JAN2025
– added MinUI “reinstallation” instructions for after flashing PortMaster-friendly firmware (thanks Shaun Inman for the tip)
– added instructions on how to add box art to MinUI

13JAN2025
– added direct link to FBNeo map.txt file for full arcade game names

18DEC2024
– added link to my MinUI Collections zip file

11DEC2024
– added stock OS section
– added KNULLI section

09DEC2024
– published guide
– added video link
– added PortMaster section

89 thoughts on “My Simple TrimUI Brick Setup (MinUI Guide)

  1. Thanks for the great guide, love being able to customize MinUI and the collections is a great add. One quick note, when adding a number for your files to dictate the order, if you go higher than 9, you will need to add a zero to the single digit folders to keep the order. Otherwise it will read 1, 10, 11, 12, 2, 3, 4, etc. Probably not an issue for most people, but I apparently don’t consolidate well enough.

    Like

  2. In regards to Portmaster (understand this is a work in progress) are these new firmware files to reside on the same SD card we just setup for MinUI?

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    1. I would recommend using a different (blank FAT32) SD card for that portion of the setup. You just need to run it one time and then you can revert back to your MinUI card.

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      1. Hi Russ,

        Thank you for all the hard work and the guide.

        The last MinUI version(MinUI-20250126-0) has merged the “tg3040” and “tg5040” in to just “tg5040”. Having any emulators in the tg3040 won’t lunch them anymore.

        Like

  3. I’m new to this and was wondering, do any other systems besides the ones listed need bios files? And if so what are they called?

    Thanks!

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    1. Looking at the list of supported cores, stuff like Amiga, Atari 5200, Intellivision, MSX, Neo Geo CD, Odyssey 2, and Saturn will need BIOS files to run properly. I would recommend the ArkOS wiki as a resource, this compiles a lot of the common systems and their BIOS requirements in a handy list. https://github.com/christianhaitian/arkos/wiki/ArkOS-Emulators-and-Ports-information

      There really isn’t a lot of documentation out there for some of these systems so it will likely require some trial and error.

      Like

  4. Hello, I am wondering were do I need to save BIOS files for pico8 and Neo Geo? everything was smooth until i reached that point and now im lost and confused.

    Also did i need to create a seperate dream cast bios files named “dc”?

    Like

    1. Hi, the BIOS locations are listed in the BIOS section. This is what I have for native Pico-8:

      Pico-8 (Native): Emus > tg3040 > PICO.pak > PICO8_Wrapper > bin > pico8.dat and pico8_64

      This is the location you’ll navigate to on your card (each folder is named and the “>” indicates that you’ll open that folder and drill down further. Once you get to the “bin” folder, add the pico8.dat and pico8_64 files from the commercial Raspberry Pi release of Pico-8.

      For Dreamcast and Naomi, you’ll need to make a folder named “dc” within the BIOS folder and add those bios files (dc_boot.bin and naomi.zip) there. You don’t need to unzip the Naomi file!

      Like

  5. also the Neomi bios is confusing, i have Naomi zip but dont know if i need to extract it? and where do i save the contents of the zip

    Like

    1. I haven’t had any luck myself, I get the same black screen. PortMaster in general is going to be pretty hit-and-miss until we get official support, which just takes time.

      Like

  6. Thanks for the guide Russ! This is why you’re the best in the biz! Will we be getting official postmaster support someday?

    Like

    1. Hey Frank, I expect that once CrossMix is out it will carry over official PortMaster support, and then we can hijack it for this janky setup too 🙂

      Like

  7. Hi Russ,

    Thank you for this amazing guide! I got my Brick today, and the first thing I did was come here to set it up.

    The only thing I can’t get to work is Arcade/NeoGeo. I followed your instructions exactly—same names, same setup, everything—but I don’t see them in the list of systems. I’ve already tried using other names, but still nothing. In the MinUI list of supported systems, I don’t see either Arcade or NeoGeo, so I’m not sure if I need to do something extra to get those systems working.

    Greetings from Mexico City!

    Like

    1. Hi Jaime, adding the MinUI Custom Paks in that section above will add FinalBurn Neo, which is an arcade core. After adding the Paks you will find the folder in Roms > Arcade (FBN). You can add your Neo Geo roms directly there (just make sure the Neo Geo roms you are using are compatible with FBNeo), or you can make a new folder in the Roms section, you can call it whatever you would like but put (FBN) at the end of the name. So you could do “Neo Geo (FBN)”, put your FBNeo-friendly roms inside, and you are good to go. Make sure you put the neogeo.zip bios file in the same folder as your games so that they boot.

      Like

      1. Hi Russ, are you seeing that many of your vertical FinalBurn Neo arcade games are rotated 90 degrees, with Vertical mode (in Options) having no effect? Trying to figure out how to remedy this.

        Like

  8. This device with the MinUI OS has overtaken RG35XXSP as my handheld of the year. Great guide Russ! You essentially have all the same collections playlists that I want. Would you mind sharing the lists for the Zeldas, Sonics and Pokemans?

    Please advise.

    Thanks!

    Like

  9. I like MiniUI but the configuration is very annoying in terms of Retroarch and the file setup.

    Despite setting the directories and save file preferences in Retroarch the saves are not saved there and instead appear to be in some other shared folder and apply the core name despite that not being enabled in RA.

    It would be manageable if RA could access this folder but it appears to be constrained to specific area of the file structure.

    I am going back to stock for now.

    Like

  10. Hey Russ,

    Great guide. Got my brick and Minui installed. Thanks very much.

    I can’t get rewind function to work. I’ve been in tools, retro arch, got the hotkeys set up and saved but they never work.

    Is this a me issue or Minui issue?

    Like

    1. Hi Jim, this is most likely a MinUI issue, it has stripped a lot of RA functionality to pare down the experience. I’ve “broken” what I can of the MinUI experience but some of it is likely just going to be better suited with a more robust OS option like KNULLI.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Thanks for the reply. I was afraid of that. Oh well, I’m still rocking Minui for now. Looking forward to the next video!

        Like

  11. First of all, thanks for the great manual, really like your approach and philosophy.

    I’m however not able to get PortMaster to work. I flashed the TrimUI Brick with a MicroSD using “trimui_tg3040.awimg”, trimui.portmaster.zip and the extracted contents of TRIMUI_EX.zip . After this however, I see a stock OS booted from this temporary MicroSD.

    When putting back the MinUI MicroSD card, and restarting the device, it no longer wants to boot MinUI. I can make it work again by restarting the process of adding a fresh MinUI and then it goes through “installing MinUI” again. So I did that and continued with adding the runtimes, the games itself, and copying the pak file from 5040 to 3040.

    Now when I start PortMaster I see the message loading sources, and then the app crashes. Am I doing something wrong? Should the contents of TRIMUI_EX also be added to the MinUI MicroSD?

    Like

    1. Hmm, I haven’t seen this issue before. I just went through my own steps again for the white TrimUI Brick that just arrived, and it all worked for me again. From the sounds of it you did everything right — those are the correct files. You shouldn’t have to put the TRIMUI_EX file in your MinUI card at all, after making that first flash I just discarded my PortMaster flash card.

      Like

  12. Hi Russ! or anybody who can help…

    I’m having a difficult time running arcade vertival games (1942, Tutankham etc) so they don’t run sideways. I go into Options and set the vertical mode to every option (being sure to save each time) but it makes no difference. Is there any way to play these arcade roms the right way up?

    Cheers,

    Andrew

    Like

    1. Hey Andrew, yeah unfortunately I don’t think there’s a way within the MinUI setup to rotate the screen. I’ve just been rotating the device and then mapping the controls on a per-game basis to match the rotated device, it was a little awkward at first but now it’s actually quite fun!

      Like

  13. I’ve learned that Minui kind of has its own options that override the ones you’d set in Retroarch. Because of that the only options available are the ones in the Minui options menu. No Retroarch hotkeys (rewind), screen settings or anything like that.

    For now we’re waiting for one of the other os’s

    to provide the experience we want, or an update to Minui.

    The Brick is still new, and I think it’s pretty popular, so hopefully we see some great work being done on these OS options.

    Like

    1. Yes, this setup is sorta the opposite of what MinUI strives for, so we end up working against the OS to add RetroArch configuration options. Something like KNULLI or muOS will eventually bring a lot more customization options to the device!

      Liked by 1 person

  14. Another thing you might want to do is enable real-time clock (Especially needed for Pokemon games) by creating a blank file called  .noTimeRestore in the .tmp_update/config folder. Otherwise, it just goes crazy not just with game time but with the system clock.

    Like

      1. Sorry, made a mistake. There’s no config folder, just put it directly in the .tmp_update folder.

        Like

    1. would you recommend a file type? I’m really new to this world and love Pokémon but I don’t know what you mean when you say blank file. Thanks!

      Like

      1. I just created a .txt file and change the name. Just make sure you don’t leve the .txt extension, you may have to enable view file extensions on your computer to do that.

        Like

  15. Hi Russ,

    I’ve been looking to upgrade from the Miyoo Mini+ that I purchased a couple years ago and decided on the TrimUI Brick after watching your review video. I have a quick question. If I setup WiFi on this, will it work for linking two of these together for Pokemon etc?

    Like

  16. i’ve checked the TrimUI README file but haven’t found the answer to this, maybe you can help — i understand that we can override the order of items in a list, overriding the default alphabetical sorting behavior.

    but i’d like to force a folder to appear at the bottom of a list. i have a subdirectory — let’s call it “Extra Games” — in the GBA ROMs directory, and i want to throw it down to the bottom, after all the ROMs in the root GBA directory. are you aware of a way to do this?

    Like

  17. MinUi is a perfect fit for this little device. I’ve set mine up, thanks to your brilliant tutorial. I ran the remove and replace the TrimUI boot screen to show the MinUi boot, but I then wanted to revert to the original, that was easy enough. But how do you re-enable the orignal Trim Loading spinny icon? As I disabled that too.

    Thank you.

    Like

  18. thank you so much for this guide Russ, it has made using the Brick exactly the experience I wanted from it. I honestly wish I’d saved some money and bought the machine without the stock card and gone straight to this.

    This might be a basic question, I’m new to these kind of devices: I followed your set up options for L3 and L4 to cycle screen options, which works fine for GB, but on the SNES emulator it doesn’t seem to have a working ‘scale’ option. It just gives me integer, full screen, full screen. Any ideas?

    Like

    1. I tried this but it seems like you probably need to do it at the installation stage? I swapped the font file out later and it didn’t change, even after deleting the original from the sd card. Unless there’s something I’m doing wrong?

      Like

      1. I couldn’t find where the font is actually referenced in the code, so I did have to rename the font to the exact same file name. This was after the install process though!

        You can find some free .otf fonts on Dafont to use (I shortened my file names, and went with the an extended font named Conthrax). Google Fonts is nice too, but I haven’t found a lot of .otf fonts on there. Kalam, Nippo, and Roboto are some more condensed fonts I tried that worked well for longer file and game names.

        Like

  19. man I can get any NES games to boot up. Black screen and then popped back to menu. Newish to emulation in general. Would any one know if this has something to do with the BIOS file not being set up correctly?

    Like

    1. I had the same issue when using compressed roms, either have them extracted or simply packed as .zip files. If they already are zipped, try extracting and re-packing again, eventually it worked for me depending on the compression method used.

      Like

  20. Superb guide as always! Is there no way to enable WiFi without a stock card? I got a barebones system with a fresh sd card and upgraded immediately to minui

    Like

  21. great guide russ, many thanks. I am having a little issue, I have put the correct bios in the corresponding bios folders & pointed minui to use the boot logos but they dont seem to work apart from ps1. No gameboy bios (gb,gbc,gba) seem to work. no biggie butt thoought I would mention.

    Like

    1. I had the same issue when using compressed roms, either have them extracted or simply packed as .zip files. If they already are zipped, try extracting and re-packing again, eventually it worked for me depending on the compression method used.

      Like

  22. **NOTE FOR THOSE WHO INSTALLED PORTMASTER**

    I followed this guide and everything worked fine until I installed Portmaster. I was able to flash and get portmaster running, but afterwards I was unable to load my MinUI install. I’d insert the SD card with MinUI but it just wouldn’t be recognized. After some reddit/discord searching I saw that you need to re-add the trimui folder (contained in the BASE minui zip linked at the top of the guide) to the root of the sd card. After I did that trim ui loaded again!

    Like

  23. I got DreamCast with MinUI up and running but it seems FlyCast is not able to load or create VMUs so games are never saved upon exit. Any solution for this?

    I found the FlyCast config files but no idea what to change or refer to as per default location for VMUs: \Emustg3040DC.pak

    Like

    1. Never mind, please delete my comments since they clutter up, the simple solution was to rename folder “DC” into smaller “dc” letters.. wow!

      Like

  24. Hi Russ,

    I purchased a brick with a card and it worked perfectly at first. I then decided to buy my own card and now am not able to get any OS running on it. No game files or apps show up, and the device acts as if there is no SD card inside. The SD card is a brand new Sandisk and it’s formatted to FAT32 as you said. I’ve tried the stock os, stockmix, and MinUI. Nothing seems to work. Any suggestions?

    Like

  25. Hi Russ – Happy New Year! Thanks for all you do… following your guide with my newly acquired Brick… I’ve triple checked everything for Pico-8 setup, I’ve got my wi-fi running on my device… but I can’t seem to find splore… is it nested somewhere I’m not finding?

    Like

  26. Excellent guide. Does anyone know the button shortcut that exits the PICO emulator (not P8)? The standard things don’t work, like Menu button or START and SELECT. I can get it to open the command prompt but no buttons close it. I need to hard restart the device each time.

    Like

  27. Hi Russ — Thank you so much for this. I wanted to ask re: PortMaster setup – about how many times did you need to restart portmaster to have it successfully install a Port’s Zip file? I am attempting to do it with UFO 50 now, and I have restarted PortMaster upwards of 10 times, with no luck. Perhaps UFO 50 is just not yet compatible?

    Additionally, I wanted to point out what appears to be a discrepancy in your PortMaster setup instructions. You indicate to copy Runtimes to Roms > Apps > PortMaster > PortMaster > libs, but it appears that the Rams and Apps folders are in separate directories from the root. I tried moving the entire Apps folder to the Rams folder to see if it would help, but no luck. PortMaster just stopped working altogether at that point. Unless something is weird with my set up?

    Any insight you might have would be appreciated!

    Like

  28. Thank you for this complete and quite simple to use tutorial, it’s certainly a lot of work here.

    Anyone has an idea for making TIC80 work ? Is it like PICO8 and this needs a wrapper ? I cannot find anything on this anywhere.

    Like

  29. Hey Russ, thanks for this tutorial! I really love minui but I’d also love to be able to run UFO50 and Balatro, they don’t boot for me in minui. Any chance that you got lucky? Portmaster works, I installed Rockheads to test and that game works.

    Paul if you figure it out, let me know! Even rolled back some UFO50 builds but it doesn’t even show the patch screen that should patch the game to work with portmaster yet.

    Like

  30. Hi Russ – thanks for this – I somehow managed to “Brick” my device – it’s stuck on the MinUI logo – what can I do? 😦

    Like

  31. “…where WiFi connectivity feels like a complication that detracts from the gaming experience.”

    …Really? I’ll be honest, anytime I hear people talk about MINUI it just sounds like they’re trying to convince themselves they actually like it. Like in Onion for example, if scrolling past the Wifi option in your Settings menu detracts from your gaming experience, you’re lost in the sauce. I simply don’t believe that Russ or anyone else ever had their gaming experience diminished in the slightest way because a Miyoo or whatever had wifi as an option. I swear the developer has gaslit people into gushing about how MINIMAL it is to avoid putting in more effort. Dear god, not one more row in our settings menu!! You’re quite literally downgrading your device (except the stock UI I guess) in order to see less visual noise. Give me quality of life features anyday. Sorry for coming off like an ass but that sentence I quoted really just came off as disingenuous to me. I understand that some people might prefer a minimal look (like some themes I’ve seen in other UIs…) but lets not invent imaginary downsides of other UIs to justify this visual look.

    All that said, thank you for the Knulli links 😉

    Like

  32. I cant get Pico-9 to run. I’ve added the raspi bios files to the folder and added my PNGs to the PICO ROM folder, but I’m getting an error Message: “COULD NOT LOAD *path of the ROM* TYPE HELP FOR HELP”
    Any Ideas?

    Like

  33. Hi! Thanks for the awesome and easy to follow MINUI guide! it works fantastic on my TrimUI Brick! However it would be great if you can also do a step by step video guide on how to install the Portmaster like you did for the MINUI?

    Im actually halfway in the process and i got stuck as im not sure about the next step in your instructions and im afraid i would mess up my Brick. Help!

    Like

  34. Thanks for the nice Tutotrial! I found out, that for some systems e.g. GBA the Scanlines or Grid do not match with the pixels, if you dont use Native Scaling. Whereas for PSX it works fine for all settings. Hopefully the can fix it kn the future.

    Like

  35. Has anyone gotten Saturn to run after installing the custom paks? I’ve tried a bunch of different BIOS files and as well as different Rom extensions and I can’t get anything to launch. Saturn does work in the cross mix card that my Brick shipped with so I’m hopeful it’s possible.

    Like

  36. Love MinUI on the Brick. Great guide as usual Russ.

    Question: Is there anyway to clean up the PlayStation (PSX) files (since there can be Bins and Cues etc) so the game list is clean. The only work around I found so far is putting each game in it’s own folder but that isn’t ideal.

    Like

    1. For each game that has Bin and Cue files, just place them into the same folder as you suggest. This will create a clean list for all PSX games. Also, for multi disc games, you will have to put all Bin and Cue files from each disc into the same one folder. You’ll also have to create a playlist text file (m3u file) to tell the OS the order of the discs. See the Read Me file in the MinUI base folder for details.

      Like

  37. Suggestions for improvements to the documentation:

    • Update instructions to reflect the fact that the latest MinUI release has merged the tg3040 and tg5040 folders

    [“Add BIOS files” section]

    • Add instructions for what files to put inside these folders: MGBA, NGPC, P8, RETROARCH, SFC, SMS, VB
    • Fix typo: “Super Game Boy: Bios > sgb.bios” should be “Super Game Boy: Bios > SGB > sgb.bios”
    • These two lines were confusing because after following instructions there was no “dc” folder:

    Sega Dreamcast: Bios > dc > dc_boot.bin
    Sega Naomi: Bios > dc > naomi.zip

    [“Adding PortMaster” section]

    • There is no Portmaster.pak file in Tools/tg5040 folder after unzipping

    Like

  38. A couple questions – they may be silly and already answered somewhere, so I apologize if that is the case.

    With the custom packs, is there a way to get N64 operable with MinUI? I’ve looked around but I can’t find anything.

    Second question, is there a way to get multicart games running locally for PICO 8? I have everything to run PICO natively, but Splore does not work for me – and I don’t have WIFI available all the time.

    Thank you!

    Like

  39. A couple questions – they may be silly and already answered somewhere, so I apologize if that is the case.

    With the custom packs, is there a way to get N64 operable with MinUI? I’ve looked around but I can’t find anything.

    Second question, is there a way to get multicart games running locally for PICO 8? I have everything to run PICO natively, but Splore does not work for me – and I don’t have WIFI available all the time.

    Thank you!

    Like

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