Xbox One isn’t very portable, so a modder turned it into a laptop

By Will Fulton September 15, 2014

Amateur hardware modder Ed Zarick has taken apart an Xbox One and rebuilt it into a custom, portable laptop with a built-in 1080p screen, the XBook One.

He completely gutted the console and built a svelte new case out of acrylic using his impressive garage workshop‘s Makerbot 2 3D printers and laser cutter. The attached Vizio LCD screen is 22″ and 1080p, which is an upgrade from his previous XBook 360‘s 19″ 720p screen. The laptop features a front-facing, slot-loading disc drive, optional HDMI output, Kinect, built-in speakers, wired power source (unfortunately battery power is just not feasible for the Xbox One), and custom fan shroud to keep it all nice and cool.

Recommended Videos

Zarick is an EMT/Fireman by day and self-taught engineer and hardware modder by night, sharing his various hacks and modifications on EdsJunk.net. His projects have ranged from the aforementioned Xbox 360 notebook and a netbook-powered mini MAME arcade cabinet to a pressurized water tank in his jeep’s stock rear bumper and an Arc reactor wedding ring box. His work is exemplary of the delightful innovations that can come out of Maker culture.

The XBook One is on sale through his website, starting at $1,095 if you provide the initial console, and should take 2-3 weeks to complete, but due to increasing publicity (like this very article) the wait list is growing quickly.

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Will Fulton is a New York-based writer and theater-maker. In 2011 he co-founded mythic theater company AntiMatter Collective…

Gaming

Bringing Helldivers 2 to Xbox eventually isn’t such a bad idea

Four soldiers walk in front of a blue Super Earth flag in the Helldivers 2 trailer.

It bugs Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer that Arrowhead Game Studios and Sony Interactive Entertainment's Helldivers 2 is not on Xbox. In a recent interview with Game File, Spencer stated that he's "not exactly sure who it helps in the industry by not being on Xbox," even though he understands that "there's a legacy in console gaming that we're going to benefit by shipping games and not putting them on other places."

That raises a good question: Should Helldivers 2 come to Xbox Series X/S? No plans for that are announced at this time. Although Spencer is likely saying Sony should do this because it would line up with Microsoft's current strategy, I don't think it would be such a bad idea once we're a ways out from this console exclusive's launch. At the very least, the wild success Helldivers 2 has seen on PC proves that PlayStation may benefit from eventually releasing more of its games on other platforms. The company already seems keenly aware of that, too.

Gaming

Starfield isn’t going multiplatform, but 4 Xbox games are

Key art for Starfield.

Microsoft finally gave its fans an update on the future of its gaming business during the Official Xbox Podcast today. It clarified some of the speculation around its first-party games going multiplatform, explaining that this move only applies to four titles.

Gaming

How to gameshare on Xbox One

Image of xbox One x console.

Gamesharing is one of the best features the gaming world has seen over the past decade. The Xbox One was one of the first consoles to fully embrace this feature, and the simple process allows you to give a person you trust access to your library of downloadable games. This feature would carry forward to the next-generation Series X and S consoles as well.

Additionally, you can gain access to the games on your trusted friend’s Xbox account. The Xbox One, Xbox One S, and Xbox One X make gamesharing easy, but this process does come with a few restrictions that you should know beforehand.