I needed a proper writing desk. So I cleared some space in the spare room for a desk, an old desktop PC and a nice mechanical keyboard. (The loved one bought the keyboard several years ago, but the offspring protested the machine-gun noises in the loungeroom.) There wasn’t a lot of room, but a 100×50cm desk for £40 was just the thing. [Amazon UK]
The monitor was an ancient NEC MultiSync LCD1880SX (5:4, 1280×1024), which was absolutely the bee’s knees in 2002! In 2025, the fluorescent backlight is clapped out, and the monitor is too dim to use on a sunny day. So it’s free to a good (or bad) home with a hobbyist interested in fixing it. You know where to contact me.
I looked through Amazon for a suitable new monitor, and I discovered an exciting new form of gadget — portable monitors! Light, 10” to 21”, USB-C power, signal via USB-C or mini-HDMI. And portable.
The use case is for laptops in cramped spaces or showing movies off a phone — but the monitors also have 7.5cm VESA mounting holes, so maybe one would make a good PC monitor? Big enough to write on, but small enough not to block out the whole window, as a cheap 24” would have.
I asked on Mastodon and Facebook and got overwhelmingly positive responses. A ton of people have bought these things and are delighted with them. [circumstances.run; Facebook]
The haul
There’s various brands, but I suspect they’re all made in a single factory in Shenzhen.
I browsed portable monitors on Amazon, but I made the purchase itself on eBay, and I advise you do the same. The brands will often have a local distributor with an eBay store. I got an Eviciv 170R01, a 17.3” 1920×1200 (16:10) screen that does 300 nits of brightness. This model is £150 new; I got a refurbished one for £100. Prices vary — shop around. [eBay]
The monitor has two USB-C sockets and a mini-HDMI socket. The USB-C can do video, power or both on the same cable. I could dimly power the screen off the USB video connection to my laptop, but it asked me to “Please Connect Recommended Extra Power.” I did so and it was much brighter.
You’ll need to figure out how to get into the menus and adjust the brightness and contrast to taste. The pixels are pin-sharp. It plays moving video just fine, as I’d have expected. The default colour balance is a bit blue, but that’s easily adjustable as well. The colours do seem a bit washed out, though.
I’m not sure the monitor has a sufficient usable contrast range for serious graphics work — though if anyone reading uses a portable monitor for graphics, please comment. (It’s the sort of gadget a photographer would want to take on a shoot, for example.)
The monitor comes with a protective cover — very like a tablet cover — that sticks to magnets in the back of the screen.
The USB power adapter (5V, 4A) only had a one metre cable. So I got a 2m USB-C extension cable for it. [Amazon UK, Amazon US]
The display was inverted 180° from what I expected. I checked the monitor’s settings and it was indeed inverted, and I changed it back to 0°. So you can easily use these monitors with the cables going into either side.
The monitor has speakers, though they’re small, quiet and tinny. I wouldn’t bother if you have anything better.
I couldn’t work out how to send video from my phone. (Yes, I still have the Xiaomi phone.) It might need USB 3.2, which is still quite recent in phones.
The PC is a 2019 Lenovo ThinkCentre m93p 10A8 SFF (10A8002CUK) with two DisplayPorts and VGA — just a very dull corporate desktop. Ideal for LibreOffice. It has USB 3.1 with a USB-A socket, but apparently doesn’t do video through the USB. So I got a DisplayPort to mini-HDMI cable for £21, and it works fine. [Amazon UK, Amazon US]
I needed something to mount the display in the window. The standalone monitor stands were too deep for the window sill, so I got a Suptek swing arm with a gas spring for £22.50. It looks smaller in real life than in the Amazon picture. It supposedly takes televisions up to 6kg, so an 800g screen is no problem. [Amazon UK, Amazon US]
I clamped the arm to the desk. It’s nicely positionable. The provided Allen keys adjust how stiff the joints are.
The monitor comes with 4mm-long VESA mounting screws that need a tiny Allen key (not provided). These kept popping out when I tilted the screen. But the screw holes are actually smaller than standard VESA — so I couldn’t switch to using the screws that came with the arm. How annoying.
Total cost: £100 for the monitor and about £50 for accoutrements.
Here’s the monitor positioned for use. The PC is on the floor at the right. On the window sill is a headset [Amazon UK, Amazon US] and some extremely cheap speakers that are still better than the monitor’s. The family got me the ring light phone mount for Christmas, suggesting I go rant on TikTok when something annoyed me. [Amazon UK, Amazon US] At top right you can see a clip-on light bulb. [Amazon UK, Amazon US]
The verdict
The monitor is bright enough to use with a sunny day behind it. The screen is at the right height and I can easily bring it forward or push it to one side.
It could do with being a bit bigger. I wouldn’t mind a 19” or 20” monitor mounted the same way, if I can find one bright enough — anything more than that would be a bit much for the space.
But that can wait. This does the job and I can write on it.
Anyway, get yourself a portable monitor. They’re ace.
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