Touchscreen Jukebox
Every “beach house” needs a good source of music. Playing CD’s on the DVD player wasn’t cutting it because it was difficult to navigate MP3 CD’s. A dedicated MP3/CD player was definitely needed. I decided that it wouldn’t cost much more to create a touchscreen jukebox like some bars have.
I was able to nab an expensive touchscreen off e-Bay for about 20% of it’s retail price which solidified my plans. Here’s the monitor (15”) I ended up getting:
I then needed something to run it. Again, I hit e-Bay. This time I came up with a 1.3Ghz, 256MB RAM very compact Compaq computer. It had just about everything built in, including 5 USB ports, video, and sound. I knew I wouldn’t be adding any PCI cards to it, so the lack of expansion there didn’t bother me. Plus, for $50, how can you go wrong??? Here is a picture of the unit:
As far as software goes, I’m running a stripped down version of Windows XP. The MP3 player (jukebox) front-end is a program called eJukebox (screenshot below).
I had a spare RF remote sitting around (The ATI Wonder Plus), so I installed & customized Girder so that I can control the jukebox remotely (while playing cards and/or drinking!). I can even rate songs from 1 to 5 stars while they play.
The touchscreen in it’s final location (the base is hidden on a shelf below it):
And here’s a video demo of the touchscreen jukebox in action. I run through selecting a song & playing it instantly, browsing by artist & album to create a playlist, playing some internet radio stations, then demo the remote control. I also show a touchscreen drink recipe program that I can access while playing music:
