Tuesday night i managed to trip over my laptop's power lead, sent the thing crashing to the floor, and ended up smashing the screen After a lot of cursing (and showing my wall who was boss with a few sharp punches ) i hooked it up to one of my monitors to see if the computer itself was working, and it was! So, it's still working fine, just needs to be hooked up to a monitor. I know i could simply replace the screen, but i've decided that since i was thinking of getting an epia and building a little silent htpc for myself, i might as well just use the laptop and save the money I have a few questions though: 1) Can i hook up a regular 3.5 hdd to the lappy mobo? I know there are converters available to run laptop hdd's in a regular rig, so i guess they can probably make converters working the other way round. Thing is, not many people need to hook up a fullsized hdd to a laptop so i dont know how easily available they'd be. Also, running via usb doesnt sound too good. 2) There's an RCA connection on it to connect to a tv. What do i need to connect it to a regular tv. The tv only has the regular co-ax aerial socket for input. No scart (might buy a new widescreen jobbie soon though) 3) The lappy has IrDA, i guess i could somehow rig this up to work with a remote? Anyone got some media software working nicely with a laptops IrDA? 4) Is usb the only option available to me if i want to hook up a keyboard? 5) I'd probably be making a custom case. For that to work i'd want extender cables for stuff like vga, rca video, network, sound, and dvd-rom ribbon (if theres a ribbon in there even?) Any idea where i could get hold of this kind of stuff? 6) Is there anything particularly different about cooling a laptop? I want it to be as quiet as possible. The lappy has one 30mm fan in there, i was thinking 120mm at low rpm would do a great job, but am i missing something? i've never taken a laptop apart before, so dont really know what to expect. Anyway, cheers for any help you might give me. I'll reward you with a project log as soon as work gets started (though i have a dissertation to do first...)
can nobody answer any of these questions? am i gonna have to break out my crazy mad google skills? damn, i was hoping i could be lazy and someone else would just hand me the answers on a platter
1) as far as i know they do excist; haven't seen one in a store but think there are a few post on here on building one 2) there are cables out there for lets say a ps or xbox to connect it to coax; sow guess yes; never really thought about this 3) irda is irda... you just need the right software (and drivers) 4) depends on what laptop you got; but most also got ps2; sow you need to check your laptop for that 5) pc store; electric store... even some lager supermarket kind of store have those kind of cables now a days, btw if you want to make a custom case; why not use the keyboard and touchpad of the laptop build in to the case; would save on an extra keyboard and mouse; and you can make it compact 6) laptops are generaly build with low power consuming electronics; sow a 120mm on the right place; maybe with a good out take would cool the thing; but don't forget the psu of the laptop is external
1) There was another guy asking the exact same question just this week As I said in that thread, desktop ones will fit electricaly, just ignore the extra 4 pins on the lappy end (they use them for power). The main problem is laptops have female connectors on the motherboard so adaptors won't plug straight in. Could sodler to the board maybe? Or buy some small enough header pins and make up a convertor pcb? 2) VGA>TV box. They will give Composite out, maybe even an RF output to plug straight into the aerial socket. If not you could get an composite>RF modulator. 3) Don't know, but would like to know too 4) No PS2 connector on the back? If not i guess USB is your only choice. 5) Maplins, Rapid, RS etc do extender cables. But as you'd probably only be using a few cm of what could be a metres worth of cable, Id be tempted to break out the soldering iron and make some custom ones Maplin, Rapid etc do connectors & cable. Don't think the DVD will have a ribbon tbh. My tosh has a proprietory looking connector, the CDROM just slides into it. 6) Mine seems to rely on using the internal metal structure as a heatsink, with a small ~30mm fan that never seems to turn on Mind you this is only 90Mhz I dare say an undervolted 120mm would do the job fine. Could probably mod a larger sink on it too. Good luck with it, and the dissertation. I gots another 1/2 years before I have to do mine yay for MEng courses
Why hasnt anyone mentioned power? If he wants to add a fan (possibly?) and up the HD, he will most likely need more power? Right? Possibly a small 100watt psu rigged to turn on at the same time as the laptop? Anyone?
he could probobly get away with the fan but both the fan and the extra hd would not be good and he pc probobly wouldent boot
cheers for the replies ok, the hdd thing, having thought about it, might be more hassle than its worth. laptop drives arent as expensive as i thought, and since most stuff will be played from dvd or network (not local hdd) the 15gig drive that i already have may be enough. if not, a 40gig one isnt too expensive to buy. still, i might be interested in looking into this later on, so the case will probably have space reserved for a drive that i may want to use in the future. getting tv out sorted is just a matter of looking for the right cable/gadget by the looks of things, so cheers for that. i'll just have a scout around in the net see what i can find if i do buy a new tv for my room though, i wont have to bother with that, as i already have a composite cable sat here doing nothing, just my current tv doesnt have composite in... IrDA, right, look for the right drivers and software... if anybody has suggestions for good software and the like that'd be great. the frontend would probably be myHTPC (as i have been using it on other systems for a while now). There's one ps2 connector. I'm guessing i could split that to handle both keyboard and mouse? I doubt they'd be used much anyway, but it'd be nice to have the option of using it as a web/email access point if and when i need it. The extenders should be fairly common i guess, but relocating the IrDA might be a total pain. I might be better off hooking up a little serial ir receiver tbh. The dvd drive is a hotswappable one with a clip in connector. I'm hoping it might be possible to use regular ide ribbon cable to extend the connection though (might have bodge up my own connectors though ) as i really would like to locate the optical drive wherever i like in the case (and facing whichever way i want!) The idea is the gubbins will all fit inside the case of an old vcr, all the outputs (sound audio etc) would come out the back, infra red sensor (and maybe lcd) would be under the smoked plexi where that kinda stuff is usually found on vcrs, and the optical drive would be accessible via the cassette tape 'flap'. So i need a fair bit of flexibility locating the ports and components. From what i can see without opening up the case, my laptop also uses some crazy big lump of metal on the inside as a heatspreader. I'm hoping i can take all the internals out of the case without messing up the cooling system. I was thinking of slapping on a big old heatsink, and hopefully a well placed slow 120mm fan would provide enough airflow. Powering the fan might be a problem though, i don't really want to whack a psu in there (the silent power brick is such an attractive part of the whole idea) though one of those tiny passive ones (you know, just like a bare board) that maplin sell would be ok. I don't much like the idea of two power leads though...
All you need is an RF-modulator, can easily be bought at Radio Shack/Walmart/Best Buy, whereever they sell DVD players. It used to connect DVD players to older TV's. That's assuming the tv-out is working on the laptop I have a laptop that I reinstalled the os and now the TV-out doesn't work and I haven't been able to find any software or anything for it...... oh well On another note, I think I've seen usb tv-tuners so you might even be able to have PVR capabilities, but probably not show-shifting. I'd do a quick google for usb tv-tuners. EDIT: in fact here ya go http://www.google.com/search?q=usb%20tv%2dtuner I look forward to seeing what you do with this! -Fiz
Im betting that is actually a s video out port. Which by the way solves the tv out situation as it is easy to buy or make an s-video to rca adapter, or maybe your tv has a n s-video port. Why i think that is a s-video port is ive never seen a laptop with one ps2 port. Maybe is is just me. But i know like my sisters laptop has an s-video out port so hey. Just check it i think you might find that it isnt one.
I've seen a laptop with just one PS2 port. In fact, almost all laptops I've seen do. You can buy a splitter cable for real cheap (try ebay) to plug keyboard and mouse into this.
are they s-video ports... on my dads newer laptop it has a port on the side of the laptop case and he also got a add on with has a s-video and the 2 yellow and white wires used but anyways... u can easily buy (i believe) a ps2 splitter witch will allow u to connect both mouse and keyboard to a single port..
it's definately a ps2 port the video out i have are 15-pin vga and composite rca i thought there might be splitters available to hook up both a keyboard and mouse, thanks for the confirmation
As far as I know irda is for data comunication and not ir remotes. I have done some reserch on the subject on my quest to make a ir reciver and found that they are incompatible. But I could be wrong.
sadly, you may well be correct. the only software i've found so far states specifically that it does not work with irda. Not such a big deal, as a serial jobbie would be a lot easier to locate in the front of the case anyway. good luck getting something working for your application though
you could always pop in a bluetooth card and use a pda with bluetooth as your remote... I know I've seen remote control software out there for pocket pc's and palm (thought about doing this too, but my pda is too old ) -Fiz
I am attempting to add a desktop hard disk to a laptop, i am having issuses atm. here is my thread the desktop hard disk power supply is a issue, but i wanted to use one over a laptop for the speed / capacity issuse. As for the idra, i was disapointed abtou it being only for data...tried using a mobo idra header to control winamp a few years back. you could always make a com port ir adaptor. The cooling should not be a issuse, sice i have broke my laptop out of the case the cpu fan only spins up when i was testing the memory (using memtest) as they are temp controlled by hardware on the laptop mobo. sounds like you are aiming to do a very similer project to me. Imp
cool, thanks for the link to your thread Impossible i have a lot of crazy stuff going on in my life atm (uni mainly), so i doubt i'll have time for this project any time soon (bizzybizzybizzybizzy ). hopefully, when i'm ready to get going, you'll have made some great breakthroughs that will undoubtedly help me out the capacity of a laptop hdd might be an issue, but since most stuff will be played over the network or from dvds a smallish one (40gb?) should be enough. i've actually managed on 15gb so far! also, the drive speed really isnt an issue. i can listen to music and watch films just fine using the laptop drive so no biggie. what exactly are you hoping to use yours for to neccessitate use of a 3.5" hdd? the main reason i thought i'd try was because a 200gb drive holds a lot of movies, and are fairly cheap. if it's a massive hassle though, there's nothing stopping me from going for the easy option and whacking another large drive in a fileserver rig. so what model laptop are you using? specs? (mines a compaq armada m700, standard specs other than the 576mb ram and dvd rom drive, nice little machine til i broke the screen )
I am struggling to get any hard disk working on it currently... i inserted the original 2.5" hd back into the laptop and the bios is not recognising it, when i place the 2.5" hard disk into a usb adaptor its also flakey, still cant get a 3.5" hd to spin up. It may be a case that i have killed the onboard ide adaptor which will in turn stop my project. I was hoping to use the pc as a small form factor after i recived the laptop for free with a broken screen. Its a 2.8gig P4 with 512mb and a dvdrw. Imp
