Where To Find Battery-Powered Monitors?

jutus writes "I work for a company which creates medical simulators using off-the-shelf components (including Linux and MacOS X). We're looking for battery powered LCD VGA monitors, but can't seem to find many appealing solutions. This just happens to be one of the rare times when Google has failed me. Does anyone know of a good starting point for such monitors and other industrial PC components?"

ha

[tps12]

Do you have any idea how much power a monitor drains? You'd be replacing all 96 AA batteries every half hour or so. Better to just get a gas generator.

Re:ha

[phorm]

They mean LCD's though, not CRT monitors. They'd be of similar power drain to a laptor on a similar battery I would think, probably less, as the LED alone doesn't have moving parts as does the rest of the PC.

is this one big enough?

[Minn_Kota_Marine]

http://www.allactionalarm.com/Portable%20LCD%20Mon itor.htm [allactionalarm.com]

"This handy unit is a battery powered LCD monitor perfect for may applications. Complete with adjustments for color, brightness, audio volume, etc. Comes with cables for video in and out. This unit perfect for mobile security systems, camera installers, etc."

Google [google.com] seemed to work fine for me.

Re:is this one big enough?

[netringer]

"This handy unit is a battery powered LCD monitor perfect for may applications. Complete with adjustments for color, brightness, audio volume, etc. Comes with cables for video in and out. This unit perfect for mobile security systems, camera installers, etc."

That's a video monitor, not a data monitor. That one is designed for security applications where video in/out means COMPOSITE video, i.e. RCA jack connectors like on a VCR, not VGA connectors.

The connectivity could work with a VGA to video adapter, but it would be about the same as using an analog TV as a PC display. You won't get enough a sharp enough picture for text.

Here's something

[prostoalex]

Maybe you should talk to these guys [mdatechnology.net]. The page is horribly out of date, but here's what they have to say:

Quantum Energy Technologies Corp. is developing electroluminescent materials that may one day be used in light sources such as low-powered battery displays, computer displays, and eventually even as light sources. The company predicts that electroluminescent materials will be the future of lighting and visual displays, replacing everything from light bulbs to computer screens. The company hopes to have a prototype in place by the fall of 2000

to rival the efficiency of other battery-powered displays, such as liquid crystal displays.

A couple of local hospitals

[MImeKillEr]

...use a mobile cart with a small desktop, keyboard/mouse and LCD. The carts also have external wireless adapters (USB, I imagine) and have small UPS' on them. When the terminals aren't in use, the UPS is plugged in to keep it charged. The computers sit in locked boxes at the bottom of the stand and the wireless adapters are bolted to them.

It looks a little like a cross between an I.V. stand (6 legs with wheels) and an adjustable boom arm. It appears lightweight, and easy to get into and out of the rooms.

Its been a while since I've been in a hospital with one of these, so I can't tell you who made it.

I'd bet this would be a much easier (cheaper?) solution than a battery-powered monitor.

Check out Kent Displays

[ip_vjl]

Kent Displays [kentdisplays.com] has different displays that use a technology that only uses power to update the display - that way, when the image is static, it uses no power.

Don't know if they fully support what you're looking for - looks like they go up to
800x600 [kentdisplays.com].

Laptop?

[TheSHAD0W]

Any particular reason you don't use a laptop/notebook PC? The whole thing is already battery powered and highly efficient, with an LCD monitor. You admittedly might have problems prototyping connections for high-speed data; I don't know what's available for, say, easy-prototyping USB connections. PCMCIA would probably be even more difficult. If it's lower speed, using the serial or parallel port would be trivial.

Re:Laptop?

[cybergeak]

yeah, a laptop, with some sort of terminal server to connect to, vnc or the like on a decent network connection would work just dandy no?

Re:Laptop?

[TheSHAD0W]

Well, they're looking for a VGA monitor; I assume they're using a computer to drive it. So why not replace both computer and display with a notebook PC?

UPS

[seigniory]

Why not just get a decent UPS (APC 1400 comes to mind) and plug into that?

simple UPS

[reinard]

Monitors have their own power cord no? Why not just get a regular LCD or CRT and get an extra UPS? That way your choices aren't limited and you can buy the right size UPS so that you have the backup time you wanted. It's most likely cheaper that way anyway.

make your own battery pack

[fist_187]

lots of LCD displays that i've seen take a DC input, not 120 AC. see if you can find one with a DC voltage that you can match with a battery.

Battrey Powred Displays

[siddiqui]

May be My company can help you if you advise us more details about the features you are looking for. i.e. Screen size, Battery life, Quantity etc. email me at [e-mail] and wefll see if we can help you in this regard.

Deep Cycle Battery and an Inverter or Not?

[mikegroovy]

You could get a Deep Cycle gell cell battery(Doesn't release fumes)and get a DC/AC inverter..

Most inverters loose about 15%-20% of their energy when converting DC to AC, so instead of using an inverter, you can search Google to find a DC ATX Power Supply for the computer... and maybe you can find an LCD monitor that runs from DC Power.. With all DC Components you can nix the inverter and have longer battery useage.

For charging you could get a battery charger that has a charge indicator.. just mount it on the cart with a retractable cord.

Good Luck!
-MikeGroovy

Battery Powered Monitors?

[jonr]

I don't quite get it, where would battery powered monitors be useful? What are you connecting them to? I assume that you are talking about some kind of portable device, but then why not use a laptop?
If it is more specalised, why not use smaller LCD?
My Google search came up with this:
http://www.ps2modchip.com/flash/dvd013.htm
http://www.ktechuk.com/ktprod/ktmarsh/tv_lcdpan_r a nge.htm
Good luck! (I'll bill you later) :)
J.