Over the weekend, I decided to see what could be done with an old, non working portable DVD player made by Polaroid. I’ve been needing a preview monitor for viewing content and playlist via my networked xbox.
The teardown went pretty smoothly. Once disassembled, I removed the dvd drive, com board, power cables, audio system and charging apparatus. When done, I had the monitor complete with composite video inputs, and the associated circuitry.
Next, a trip to Target for a suitable picture frame. The model chosen, 2.99 on sale! What made this frame interesting is the innards. After a little work with the dremel, I was able to fit the entire board and power supply components into the frame! Temped things up with a little hot glue and powered her up for the post assembly test!
Results. I’ve got a mini monitor that handles composite video signal for playing things like xbox, ipod or plain ‘ole TV. As you see in the pic, I’m playing video content off my ipod.
As there is still a bit of room in the frame, I’m going to mount a balun inside the frame as well. This will convert composite video to twisted pair, and allow me to run both video and power to the unit via a single Cat5E cable for a really clean install.
Update 2-6-10
Here’s a shot of the frame opened up. You can see in this photo where I took the inside of the frame and used the dremel to open up the inside of the backing, the flipped it over 180 deg. to provide the extra depth needed to house all the circuitry.
Here’s another shot that includes the audio/video splitter I’ll use to provide input to the frame as well as my main TV. The splitter, made by Niles Audio, takes a single left right audio and video connection and splits it into 4 outputs. Also pictured is my xbox remote that I’ll use to navigate the content.
