Marshall Brain's Blog

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PopSci is running an interesting article this month that describes how to make your own LCD picture frame to display your digital photos. Basically you take an off-the-shelf LCD monitor, add an inexpensive motherboard/power supply/hard drive, load Linux on the HD, copy all your digital photos to the HD and let it display a slide show continuously. In other words, you build a complete Linux PC for about $500 or $600 and use it to display pictures. A little pricey, but interesting.

The part that is most intriguing to me is the level of the project. It used to be that a do-it-yourself project in PopSci or PopMech involved building a lamp, or making a side table. Now it involves building an entire PC...

On Slashdot it was pointed out that mini-itx.com has a very similar article using a mini ITX motherboard. Another article shows how to cannibalize an old laptop (more details). Several people suggested simply buying an older, used laptop on eBay and dedicating it to the task -- no frame, no mat, just fold back the display and hang it on the wall. That way you get the display, processor, hard disk and OS all in one ready-to-go package, and you probably only have to pay about $100 for it if you shop carefully.