Motorola Lapdock turns $5 Raspberry Pi Zero into a laptop

The Raspberry Pi Zero is a $5 single-board computer that you could use as a low-power desktop if you hook up a keyboard, mouse, and external display. But what if you want to the tiny computer as the brains of a laptop?

You could try to piece the components together yourself… or you could just add a Motorola Lapdock. In fact, as one person has demonstrated, you can even open up Motorola’s discontinued product and place the Raspberry Pi Zero inside for safe keeping.

The Motorola Lapdock looks like a compact notebook computer, but it’s actually just the shell of a PC. Motorola launched the product in 2011 as a device that would let you use some smartphones like notebook computers, but it wasn’t a big seller and the company discontinued its Lapdock products about a year later.

But it’s found a second life in recent years as people have wired Raspberry Pi, MK802, and other mini PCs into the system to run Android or Linux software on a cheap, partially homemade laptop.

One problem with most of those projects though, is that you’d end up with a bunch of wires running from the computer to your mini-PC. But the Raspberry Pi Zero is so tiny that everything fits in the case with some minor modifications.

You can still buy new or used Lapdocks from Amazon or eBay.. but they’re not as cheap as they used to be. Prices seem to run from $85 to $300. For that price, you might just be better off buying a new laptop.

But if you’ve got an old Lapdock lying around and $5 burning a hole in your pocket, now you can build your own laptop with just a few cables and a knife to cut away a little plastic.

You can find more photos and other details at h-i-r.net.

via Hackaday