- Vimpo hosted a Minecraft server on a cheap AliExpress smart LED bulb
- The bulb used a BL602 RISC-V microcontroller operating at 192 megahertz
- The microcontroller had 276 kilobytes of RAM and 128 kilobytes of ROM
A hardware enthusiast known as Vimpo has taken up the phrase “can it run Doom?” to a new level by managing to host a Minecraft server on a low-budget smart LED bulb.
The project started with a light bulb purchased on AliExpress and powered by a BL602 RISC-V microcontroller, a tiny chip with a single 192 MHz core, 276 KB of RAM, and minimal I/O.
Despite such limited hardware, Vimpo managed to turn the bulb into a fully functional game server.
From light source to gaming host
The hacker started by opening the bulb’s housing and carefully removing its microcontroller.
The wires were then soldered to its headers and connected to a USB-to-serial adapter to establish a stable communications interface.
This setup allowed Vimpo to control the bulb, turning it on and off before converting it into what he calls a “system” ready to host a Minecraft server.
Although the process is more like electronic DIY than traditional web hosting, it essentially mimics the logic behind setting up a remote server.
The real challenge lies in the software side of the project.
Running a Minecraft server on such limited hardware required a simplified implementation called Ucraft.
Vimpo notes that “the binary size is approximately 46 KB without authentication and 90 KB with the authentication library.”
Even under the stress of ten players, total memory usage barely exceeded 70 KB.
These numbers may impress anyone familiar with typical game server hosting demands, but Vimpo admits that Ucraft “lacks most, if not all, of the Vanilla server features.”
While server performance won’t replace professional Minecraft server hosting anytime soon, experience shows how flexible embedded systems can be.
The smart bulb has essentially become a miniature web hosting device, although its capabilities remain more of a novelty than a practical advancement.
Still, it joins a growing list of unconventional technological exploits, from running ChatGPT-like AI models in Minecraft to recreating the game using COBOL code.
Projects like Vimpo’s light bulb server remind us that curiosity, not utility, often drives hardware innovation. In technology, there is a fine line between creativity and absurdity, and modern game server hosting can be reinvented on the smallest scale possible.
It may not enlighten the world of computing, but it certainly illuminated the idea of what “running Minecraft” can mean.
Via Toms Hardware
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