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I have made this digital picture-photo frame from an old Toshiba Satellite laptop. This project took me half a day but the result was very rewarding. My new 14″ digital photo frame works just great and I have tons of space for all my pictures.
My laptop was in a good working condition but the LCD cover was cracked and the laptop wasn’t powerful enough to handle some applications. Instead of selling it for $80-90 I decided to convert this old lappy into something useful.
First of all, I had to find a frame witch is big enough for my project. I found a really good wooden frame in a local Fred Meyer store for $20.
The laptop display panel had been disassembled. I removed front bezel, LCD cover and hinges.
For this project you’ll need a laptop with a long flexible video cable. For some laptop brands you can find disassembly instructions in the service manual.
On this picture you see the back side of my frame. I removed both original wall mounting brackets and later I’ll replace them with more reliable brackets.
The LCD screen will be mounted under the black cover. In my case, I opened 8 locks and removed the cover.
The LCD screen had been disconnected from the laptop. I positioned the screen inside the frame. In order to secure the LCD screen inside the frame, I had to cut off 4 pieces from the frame packing cardboard. These cardboard pieces will fit tightly between the LCD screen and the frame, so the screen stays in the same place all the time.
As you see, the inner paper frame is not big enough for my 14″ LCD screen.
I had to remove the inner paper frame and resize the internal part of the frame to fit my LCD screen.
After that I installed the inner frame back in place, placed the LCD screen inside the frame, installed four cardboard pieces and secured them with duct tape.
This black cover will be placed above the LCD screen and will separate the screen from the laptop. Before I placed the cover in the frame, I had to remove 8 locks.
The laptop had been placed on the top of the cover. I had to cut off two openings in the cover, so I can run the video cable to the LCD screen.
I secured the cover to the frame with duct tape. Now the LCD screen is sealed pretty good and duct tape will prevent dust from getting inside.
Finally, I secured the laptop base to the frame with a few wooden bars. Doesn’t look very sexy? Who cares! You’ll never see the back side of my frame when it’s placed on the wall. I also secured the power cable to the frame.
My digital picture-photo frame is almost done. Now I’ll have to attach the wall mounting brackets.
I made two brackets from a 2mm wire. Should be strong enough to keep my frame on the wall.
Before I placed my brand new photo frame on the wall, I uploaded all my pictures to the laptop hard drive via wireless connection. I installed Google Picasa software (free) and set the screen saver to start playing all my pictures after 1 minute.
Now, when I press on the power button, the laptop loads Windows and after one minute the screen saver kicks in.
July 20th, 2012 at 7:16 am
Very Nice. Now, i am going to do this project with my Uncle’s old Hp Laptop and i am pretty sure i am going to get awesome results and masterpiece frame hanging in my Guestroom
March 3rd, 2012 at 9:04 am
lol, this looks like a fun project, I would have removed the screen hinges, turned the lcd backwards on the laptop and bolted it to the bottom of the laptop leaving leaving enough room for the fans, then punched holes on the top where the keypad is for wall mounts and voila! Although I would add that replacing XP with a lite linux distro (maybe DSL Linux) would help in running a thin os and will definitely save on boot/load times and may save on electricity too.
I have a few other ideas for old laptops although they are all for small business/office setups, like running a dedicated print server, or a small network Intrusion Detection System, or even a wifi radius server.
January 10th, 2011 at 7:50 am
very nice
January 5th, 2011 at 10:40 am
as comment to KK.(LOL,) I believe this section is called “fun things” and not the most spectacular or even reasonable! I Hate discarding electronics, recently dumped 4 monitors and all I could think of was what fun stuff fo the house, including security uses. Sure it looks bit ungainly and chunky but…what fun..I like it!
November 6th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
That is just AWESOME, I will have to look into that!
November 1st, 2009 at 9:38 am
Why not just hang the laptop on the wall .. c’mon folks .. folding a laptop on the back of a frame isnt a digital frame .. so why not try this .. buy a conventional TV and make a hole to the wall enough to fit this in and make it look like a flat screen, on the room behind, you will see the remaining but not from the living room
Sorry but i did not like the idea. ..
September 18th, 2009 at 1:44 am
Excellent idea, well implemented, but wouldn’t this use a lot more electricity that a dedicated photoframe? Just something to be aware of with the price of electricity increasing sharply every year.
May 5th, 2009 at 10:02 pm
Michael,
You are welcome. I really glad I made the frame. It still works great and have it on the wall.
May 3rd, 2009 at 5:03 am
DIY Tech Guys,
I was just trying to get more information on opening my D820 and came across this great idea. I work in a computer shop in Iraq and had to get rid of a lot of broken down laptops, well instead of throwing the next one out I plan on doing this project with my spare time. Hard part out here will be finding the frame. I will be attempting this with a Dell 610/610. Wish me luck..I can rip these things apart and put them back together with ease, but never thought about makeing one of these..Thanks for sharing this project…
SSG Losoya, Michael
1st Cav Division, 3BCT
FOB Marez, Iraq
October 12th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Gilson,
I doubt that you can connect your laptop display to the picture frame.