I would love a toughbook! I had a go with one when our car broke down last year and the roadside rescue guy came to tow us. Due to a manufaturing defect most of the car's drivetrain shattered when wee were driving down the road at about 25mph. Anyway the rescue guy turned up in his van and popped his toughbook out. I asked him about it, so to demonstrate he then closed the lid and dropped it. Popped it back open again and carried on.

Shame they're so expensive.

I've stripped the laptop down before out of boredom. It took me ages to figure out how to remove everything. I've got a few other things I might do while I'm in there. Back in March I was recording a gig that some friends, andrewcc included, were playing. The venue was tiny  so my laptop was basically in the crowd. Needless to say it got bumped. Now, where the audio interface was plugged into the firewire socket it's a little loose and cuts out sometimes. I'll re-solder that while I'm in there.

As for the screen I don't see it being that difficult. I've been doing a little research and apparently a lot of laptops use a standard connector inside, mine included. My idea is I look for any screen using that connector and of the correct dimensions.I'm also wondering if I could get away with using a higher resolution version. My current screen is WXGA (1280x800) which I find a bit cramped sometimes. I've found a WSXGA LCD from a Lenovo Thinkpad that uses the same connector and the same dimesnsions. I wonder if it would work.  I saw an article on Hackaday.com where someone did something like this witha Lenovo and it worked.

A higher rsolution screen doesn't cost a huge amount more and I'm about to sell some things giving me a bit more moolah towards this little project.

Thoughts?