I needed a device that would enable me to interact with my x-box running XBMC, allow me to watch streaming internet TV in the garden, or control my music collection from anywhere in the house etc .I managed to find a wireless video sender and reciever at a knock down price .
Managed to get the transmitter and reciever for 10 which was a bargain, wired them both up and tested them out, got a good signal throughout the house.
Now i could start thinking about a screen and a case for my project, i had the width i wanted from the AV sender, overall dimensions would have to be as small as possible to make it portable, but would also have to have a large enough screen to be of any use. After looking around at different size displays i eventually decided on the official Sony PSone LCD screen.
The pictures on the right show the LCD after it has been stripped
Here are some specs 5 TFT LCD Screen
7.5v 3a
640 480 Resolution
Stereo Sound Output
This LCD offered a good resolution at a decent size, managed to get hold of a redundant one and started stripping it.
I also decided on a , i marked out the screen size and made a template, cuts were made using a dremel cutting disc to score them, and then snapped off with pliers.
The box is nice and shiny aluminum underneath, but i m leaving the protective sheet on until later to avoid it getting scratched
Now i had the front panel cut out, i could start to see what the thing was going to look like.
I tried a few things out, realised it was going to be really tight, but worked out that i was going to be able to fit everything in there
I purchased some motorbike windshield trim and cut it to the correct lengths, this was then applied to the bare metal edges of the front panel, this is also quite handy to hide sloppy cuts :)
A piece of acrylic glass was cut to the correct shape of the widow and held in place with hot glue,
then a small frame was constrtucted out of some scraps of black plastic to mask around the edges of the LCD screens metal trim,
this was also held into place with hot glue.
Then finally the LCD was also glued into place.
Then it was time to strip the AV reciever down, as expected, not much to it when you get it open
I used a mounted on some stripboard, all the LED s were wired up to this to allow the unit to be modular, holes for the LED s were drilled and th PCB was then mounted on the project box
I wired the remaining wires to a ethernet socket.
This meant i could just wire up an adapter from the Psone LCD to the AV reciever
A hole was drilled in the case and the IR sensor was fixed there, the speaker was also mounted inside the case, there are air vents in the base of the unit which allow the sound to escape 
In the picture on the right, you can see the PCB header socket hot glued into place on the top of the PCB, you can also see the wiring for the IR sensor sticking out behind it.
The ethernet connection is also visible behind, the unit is now completly modular and can be disconnected and connected to a different LCD screen very easily with just a different wiring loom.
This was a feature i definetly wanted as this, as with everything is only a prototype
An external DC socket was also installed as well as the new power button, a template was printed and holes were drilled on the rear of the project case to accomodate the LED s, Power Switch, UHF Aerial and DC sockets
The wiring loom was then made using a CAT 5 plug and the original PSone Wiring Loom.
The Psone LCD screen powers up automatically when it detects a Composite video signal, this is great as it means you only need one power switch on the unit without having to hack a circuit together
Although for this prototype the unit is going to be powered using their seperate original DC power packs, for the next revision I am going to add a battery pack
Another consideration for the next revision is the inclusion of brightness and volume controls. I use it currently by controlling to volume of the actual X-Box via the remote control, but this also affects any other clients who are viewing its 2ghz signal
Overall I m happy with the unit, it serves its purpose, looks good and cost about 30 to make!
News RSS