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The "RadioSphere"
By Audun
Lindbraaten - Oslo, Norway
- Posted on 25 August 2003
Introduction
From the first time I saw the projects
here on this site back in summer 2002 I’ve wanted
to do one myself. I made a MediaBox based upon an old
CD player and a Epia
800Mhz. A very funny project to do, but not that original.
A year later I stumbled upon my next project at a flea market,
and this project should be something that you never had seen
before!
The RadioSphere
This is the lamp shade I found at the flea marked. It just
screamed at me and told me to convert it into to a Mini-ITX
project!
I stared by making a little sketch
of my intention with the project, it should be "wireless"!
I wrote down my ideas and thoughts around the system:
• As silent as possible
• As few cables as possible
• A "nice" design that can fit into my living
room as well as in my office
• Small
• Cheap! (I will mostly use old parts) Then I decided what hardware to use (this has changed a
bit in the final project):
• Lamp shade!
• EPIA 800 Mini-ITX (800Mhz)
• 128Mb RAM
• 1,2Gb Laptop HD
• "Slimline" CD/DVD (Not used)
• 55w ext. "silent" PSU
• W-lan PCI card (Changed to USB version)
• Audio card PCI (The onboard soundcard is broken!)
• FM Transmitter
• Antenna
• Cold cathode light (Blue)
• Wireless keyboard & mouse The next step was to do a couple of CAD drawings of the
case and decide how to fit the parts into it. This was how
I first intended it to look like, but in the end I had to
do some adjustments.
This is a side view of the case, I’ve
moved the HD and taken out the DVD in the final case.
Top view of the case, I’ve also
skipped the PCI riser card and changed the W-Lan card to
an USB type.
I ordered an FM-Transmitter kit from CanaKit.
I soldered it together and ended up with this. It has an
transmitter
radius of about 20 metres.
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