The Raspberry Pi isn’t just a very cheap PC, it’s also tiny and uses very little power. So it isn’t too surprising to see one hooked up to a battery and display in a makeshift portable workstation.
SK Pang Electronics sell a wide range of gadgets and components, so when the Raspberry Pi got delivered they didn’t hang about experimenting with it. What they have done is combine a mini wireless keyboard typically used with a smartphone, a USB power pack, and an small LCD monitor usually found in the backseat of a car.
All components, including the Raspberry Pi, were mounted on a laser cut, transparent base with a specially cut hole acting as a handle for carrying the unit around. The difficult bit was figuring out how to power both the display and the Raspberry Pi from the single USB power pack.
To overcome the problem SK Pang had to do some rewiring as the display required 12v, but the power pack only offers 5v. The 5v regulator was bypassed, but that can cause issues as the voltage protection is removed and the display could get damaged if not handled correctly.
The other mod that had to be carried out was splitting the cable to the pack, thus allowing a second connector to be added for the Raspberry Pi board.
Adding a battery pack to the Raspberry Pi makes a lot of sense, and I’ve suggested as much to at least one case manufacturer. It means one less able to plug in, and with the amount of power the Pi draws, you could run it on a smartphone battery for quite I while I’d imagine. I’m not sure about a tiny display though, as it seems to have limited use cases.
Another project I’d like to see is someone ripping the guts out of an old laptop and fitting a Raspberry Pi inside instead. The end result should look like a typical laptop without anyone being able to tell there’s a $25 PC running inside.
Read more at SK Pang