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Thermaltake
7" LCD Monitor Installation went smooth and fast with the outer frame locking in place with the 'wing' cuts noted earlier. The USB and 15 pin VGA connectors are external connectors that are fished out of a specifically precut tab in the rear of the Mozart Tx for connection to the rear I/O of the mainboard. Before you ask, the VGA cable was about half the thickness of a normal VGA line so cable routing didn't prove to be problematic in the least. A small plastic beauty ring of sorts fits around the outside of the front bezel of the monitor making for a cleaner look of the unit installed in the case. Unfortunately, the beauty ring didn't fit as firmly in place as I would have liked and showed itself as being able to be knocked loose easily. Software installation also went without a hitch making use of the touch screen functionality. Calibrating the screen is an absolute necessity as our test unit touch screen moved exactly opposite our finger motions on the screen before the unit calibration was done. The included touch pen's usefulness wasn't fully apparent until I had used the touch screen for an hour or so. A touch screen is just that in case I've been vague; the mouse curser moves in relation to where you trace its desired movement on the screen with your finger much like the cash registers you see at McDonald's or Burger King. The initial resulting fingerprints and smudges made an irritating impression forcing me to use the touch pen shortly into testing to keep the screen crystal clean and clear. The touch screen is optimized to work best at 640 x 480 resolution but will work at higher resolutions just not as cleanly. Remember, this is a 7" monitor, so 1600 pixel resolution makes text and icons difficult to read. If you do in fact have Superman eyes, you'll be interested to know we were able to run the little Thermaltake monitor at 1600 x 1024 @ 60Hz resolution which is its true range limit.
Something odd I wanted to show was the display. From a certain angle, if you squint hard enough, you can see all the LCD display points. Some of these being AM/FM, apparently radio?? As well as Bass, volume and treble display icons. The manual didn't mention these except for the volume which makes me wonder were these functions on the original monitor design which Thermaltake tailored to the Mozart Tx or are these functions that may be added later with a software release? Unfortunately, I don't have that information so we'll all have to wait and see.
Conclusion Thermaltake's tiny 7" monitor was a fun and functional unit made even more so with its touch screen capability. Having a monitor deploy and retract into a case much like a CD-ROM made a great conversation piece as well as making my HTPC that much more user friendly. Here is where the true value of Thermaltake's 7" monitor really shines. With a multi monitor display set up I could use the touch screen to operate Windows and DVD playback programs in a non intrusive way with the whatever movie I selected was showing on monitor two for the room's enjoyment. The only problems we really ran into with the device were the outer beauty ring around the bezel not locking in firmly and our discovery that removing the monitor unit from the outer case mounting frame once installed was no piece of cake. I don't see this as a huge issue as the monitor is deigned to only fit in a specifically designed bay offered only in the Mozart Tx case so swapping the unit from one box to another won't be happening. Overall these two issues were greatly outweighed by the enjoyment and practical function the Thermaltake 7" monitor brought to the table. HTPC owners looking for something a little different, look no further. A 7" monitor to control HTPC functions on an already conversation piece ready Mozart Tx case is just the ticket and one we can heartily recommend. Pros
Cons
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All pages Copyright © 2000 - 2008
by R. Dean Barker.
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