V4Z80P: The 8-bit Laptop

November 8, 2010 by James Munns 14 Comments

[Phil] over at Retroleum has cobbled together a clean, well put together laptop based entirely around a Zilog Z80 microprocessor and a pair of Spartan II FPGAs. These FPGAs allow him to reduce the number of devices on his board, and therefore cut his production cost as well as device size. He even managed to integrate a salvaged PSOne screen. The laptop comes complete with [Phil]’s own Homebrew OS as well as a great graphical vector based demo.

Sure he’s updated the project in recent years to shrink the board, speeding up the Z80, and increasing the peripheral speed and functionality, but we’re suckers here for a total package hack. Seriously though, check out the newest version of the device as well as the backlog that shows the project growing over time.

Thanks to [Steth] for the heads up.

A Desktop Made Of Air

August 17, 2010 by James Munns 19 Comments

Deskbook Air Guts

[Bart] managed to get his hands on a Macbook Air for free. The catch was that the monitor hinge was broken and the laptop wasn’t in too great of a condition. Rather than scrapping it or using it as a cake cutter, he decided to turn it into a keyboard PC. By removing the internals he was able to fit all of the components with minimal modification. [Bart] has added a few things to make it a functional desktop, such as integrating a USB hub under the the keyboard and fitted the keyboard with a Magic Trackpad. As with any great hack, the project is still in progress, and we can’t wait to see the final touches as it comes together.

Windows 7 Tablet In A Carbon Fiber Case

June 8, 2010 by Mike Szczys 17 Comments

If you’re not one of Apple’s devoted following the iPad means little more than new hardware you won’t use. Tired of being left out in the cold, [Slampana] built himself a Windows 7 tablet. He grabbed the motherboard and 13.4″ screen from an MSI X320, added a resistive touch screen, USB hub, internal WiFi and Bluetooth, then wrapped it up in a custom-built carbon case. It’s small, sleek, and comes in at around $600-$700. Start your drooling as you watch the demo after the break.

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Cramming More Pixels Into A Thinkpad

May 19, 2010 by Mike Szczys 50 Comments

Not willing to settle for 1400×1050 on his Thinkpad, [Lawrence Sheed] set out to upgrade the LCD screen. He ordered a 15″ replacement screen that brought the eye candy up to an impressive 2048×1536 QXGA format. The replacement fits perfectly for a nice factory look. Other than some delicate disassembly you might need to flash the EDID but in [Lawrence’s] case it wasn’t necessary. If you’re going to haul around a full-blown laptop it might as well have some killer resolution and now you know how to make that happen.

Homebrew MagSafe

February 14, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 33 Comments

[Freeload] sent us his custom MagSafe adapter build for laptops. MagSafe for those unaware is Apples (patented) power adapters that prevent damage to laptops when the cord is accidentally yanked from the socket. While we’ve seen some custom versions before of MagSafes they were usually bulky, ugly, and used a ton of unremovable glue. We really like [Freeload’s] because its quick, good looking, and the best part – completely removable without marks or damage. In short, an easy weekend project that could one day save your laptop.

Simple Laptop Conversion

January 22, 2010 by Caleb Kraft 16 Comments

[Jakob] sent in his method of dealing with broken laptop hinges. Broken hinges are a plague. We have no less than 4 laptops lying around that are beyond repair with broken hinges. Some are just propped up against things, some have had box hinges glued to them and some are just waiting to die slowly from non use. [Jakob] has a nice neat conversion where he basically made a tablet. We’ve seen that before as well as picture frames. His version, while being quite possibly easier than most of the others, has a neat design aspect. An extended lip at the bottom fits in a groove in a plastic slab. All in one PC becomes a tablet in an instant. Not too shabby for a broken laptop. It looks like he needs to pop a touch screen kit on it though.

The Harlequin Project

December 11, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 15 Comments

This impressive little mod is quite fantastic really. [pakkei] has constructed the Harlequin, a home-made version of the Microsoft courier. This was a stock Dell mini9. Now, coupled with a display link touch screen monitor that happens to be identical in size and resolution to the original, it has become a new device. He has loaded Windows7 and is currently working on a case that can hold all the bits a little more organized than what you see above. We can’t wait to see this finished.

[via engadget]