Framing in the wall to hold a touchscreen...

[beelzerob]

I've got 4 planned locations for touchscreens. One will be on the outside of the wall, to bring it out from under the cabinets. But the other 3 locations will have the screen embedded in the wall. Right now, the walls are open....should I add some kind of cross member between the studs to support the eventual touchscreen? I don't have any for sure screens chosen....I own 2 fujitsu touchpads and I'm working on getting an ELO 15" (though that will be the surface mounted one).

If I should add something, what depth in the wall should it be? I don't want to add something that is actually going to keep me from being able to get the screen in there.

Thanks!

 

[dkemme]

I did no framing at all. Took the ELO 15" touch screens out of the plastic case they came in, cut a hole in the dry wall, and attached directly to dry wall through the mounting holes in the ELO touch screen.

 

[MikeB]

Looks good! Have any pictures of the finished product?

 

[68sting]

Here's a link to my touch screens. You really don't need anything behind as dkemme stated.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/14665852@N04/...5822048/detail/

 

[beelzerob]

Here's a link to my touch screens. You really don't need anything behind as dkemme stated.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/14665852@N04/...5822048/detail/

Ok, I'll leave 'em alone then. I see from your pics that even a stud in the way won't be an issue (none of these are going where load bearing members are).

Are those ELO screens? I hope to be getting one soon. I see the power and VGA cable...what cable is used for the touch? Is it a serial cable? If so, then the cat5 I have running to the touchscreen locations should be good enough.

 

[JohnWPB]

As mentioned, there is no real reason to have to put cross members in for support.

I did put cross members in, as I wanted to mount the screen flush with the wall. Mounting it to the drywall just left it sticking out too far for my taste. Its pretty hard to get in there to nail in a cross member and such, so I got creative I used a couple of 1" x 1" pieces of wood, with brackets I got at Home Depot. This let me screw them into place, and put them to the exact depth I wanted to mount the screen flush. (actually I went about 1/4 inch further into the wall then flush, so the emitters on the screen would work without having to use the foam tape to hold the frame out a bit) I just cut the drywall out large enough to not only fit the back of the screen, but the metal bezel as well. This also gave me nice solid wood to screw into, and not have to try to screw it into the drywall to mount it.



You can check out the rest of the photo's of the project HERE. the 4th picture shows the bracket that I made. I did 2 of these, one for the top and one for the bottom.

 

[68sting]

Yes they are ELO. Mine are usb. Get serial if you can. Better driver for mulitple touch screens on one computer and easier to extend with cat5.

 

[dkemme]

Looks good! Have any pictures of the finished product?

This is the most used feature of the touchscreen, too look at pictures. Initially thought would just have running for a few minutes after each use and then go blank, but it was so popular, now runs 24/7 in the kitchen. Sometimes the kids will stare at it for hours (guess I shouldn't be too surprised given the hours they will stare at the TV).

 

[ver0776]

As mentioned, there is no real reason to have to put cross members in for support.

I did put cross members in, as I wanted to mount the screen flush with the wall. Mounting it to the drywall just left it sticking out too far for my taste. Its pretty hard to get in there to nail in a cross member and such, so I got creative I used a couple of 1" x 1" pieces of wood, with brackets I got at Home Depot. This let me screw them into place, and put them to the exact depth I wanted to mount the screen flush. (actually I went about 1/4 inch further into the wall then flush, so the emitters on the screen would work without having to use the foam tape to hold the frame out a bit) I just cut the drywall out large enough to not only fit the back of the screen, but the metal bezel as well. This also gave me nice solid wood to screw into, and not have to try to screw it into the drywall to mount it.

Nice thing about this method is that if you decide you need to remove the monitor, you can use the same 1"x1" wood to support a piece of sheetrock, so patching is a breeze.

Vaughn

 

[beelzerob]

Ok, sounds like should I determine I need it, I can add the support post-drywall.

I agree dkemme, doing a picture slideshow screen saver is a fantastic idea. It's one of the strongest points of using a touchpad, in my opinion. You end up seeing photos you didn't even realize you have, and the alternative is that they sit on your harddrive and get forgotten.

I did the electrical walkthrough today, and I was kinda worried about how I could get power to the touchscreen. I was going to put an outlet on the wall behind the touchscreen locations, and run the power cord down through the wall and then out just above the outlet and then plug it in. I really didn't like the aesthetics of it, and in most locations it would create an outlet either in a really weird location or unusable for anything else.

So I asked the electrician for suggestions, and he thought a bit, and then suggested that for the upstairs locations, they wire an outlet in the attic above. Then I'll run a smurf tube from the attic down to the touchpad location. So, when I'm ready to put a touchpad there, I'll just run the power cord up the smurf tube and plug it into the outlet up there. For first floor locations, I'll do the same, but down in the basement. I like it!

 

[dkemme]

Why not run 18/2 to all the potential locations for the touchscreen power down to the equipment room? You could run them all from a single transformer. I have two touchscreens and two carputers all running from one transformer, but am quite impressed with that Elk powerstation.

 

[beelzerob]

Why not run 18/2 to all the potential locations for the touchscreen power down to the equipment room? You could run them all from a single transformer. I have two touchscreens and two carputers all running from one transformer, but am quite impressed with that Elk powerstation.

how do you go from a 3-prong PC-monitor type power cord to 18/2 wire? The ELO screens I've seen have a plugin just like a monitor.

 

[ctwilliams]

Not to far off topic, but I throw my vote in for the display of pictures. I have scanned in all of our old pictures and we have two different screens in the house that cycle through all of the several thousand going all the way back to when we (wife and I ) were born. It is so much better than just having them sitting in a box in the attic...

I highly recommend it.

 

[dkemme]

how do you go from a 3-prong PC-monitor type power cord to 18/2 wire? The ELO screens I've seen have a plugin just like a monitor.

Oops, I have Planars and they all have power supplies. I wonder if the ELO has a power supply internally that could be harvested when removing the monitor from the case to mount in the wall, but you better be ready for all possibilities.

 

[Ranger Digital]

some elo's external trans some internal. I imagine there must be a way to disect the internals. got a scapel?