I have two 15" ELO touchscreens mounted in my house - working well. Both are serial RS-232 control, 15 pin VGA. Each one has a dedicated PC connected to it running Windows 7 (I think that might be the latest version of Windows that I have drivers for). I am looking to replace the PCs with something more compact (ideally, not necessary) but definitely lower power. I was looking at Intel NUCs, I don't see any with serial ports but I imagine I could try USB to serial. Is there anything else out there?
Serial and VGA? Wow...no, I don't think you're going to find anything modern that is going to work. I was thinking if it has USB and HDMI you would use an Intel Compute Stick but it sounds like that won't work with your hardware.
Have you thought about using an Android tablet instead? You can pick up a 10" model for less than $100.
You can use USB serial and USB VGA devices with Intel NUCs. Since you can connect more than one USB serial and USB VGA connected to the same NUC, I wonder if your drivers could treat the two screens separatly and only have a single NUC.????
There's a company that makes replacement lids which implement the extra features found on some NUC boards. The name sounds like something you drink before a lower endoscopy procedure : https://www.gorite.com/
This doesn't really answer your question but an option. Maybe you could replace the whole system with an all in one windows touchscreen. I have one of this and it's working extremely well.
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By the time you add a NUC and other stuff, this looks pretty good. And Windows 10.
Is there a reason you have to run windows? I would think a tablet would be easier to mount and it's all contained in one, so no cords to run.
Have you tried wall mounting these?
I don't think I have to use Windows. I am just running chrome in full-screen. Also, I custom mounted the ELO touchscreens - framed out and then trimmed in matching trim to the room. Replacing the screens would be a lot more work. Eventually I will have to do this but for now they are working well. I just want to cut down my power consumption.
It appears that this NUC does have a serial port and VGP port built in.
https://simplynuc.com/essential-fanless/
But for $329, would your power savings be significant enough to make it worth it?
Indeed it has everything. Good find. But you are right about the price.
Yeah, I was going to build a frame for it but work and family life got in the way again!
Look for industrial PCs...if you can live with linux, there are likely dozens of options. Most are ARM, but Ubuntu or Mint should run well on them, and you can use chrome or chromium.
VGA and Serial are still mainstream in that market.
S.
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@simon4 If you're adventurous, perhaps you could try running a Raspberry PI with anHDMI to VGA adapter. You would also need a USB to RS232 adapter, plus some Elo touchscreen drivers for Raspian. Then you could run Chromium on Raspian. This would be a relatively low-cost solution, and would not use very much power. It would definitely take a little bit of work to get the touchscreen working, though.
We use Elo touchscreens around the globe in our manufacturing plants for factory floor automation. Most are still the older VGA/RS232 variants. We typically run these with HP business-class desktop PCs running Win10x64. These mostly run SCADA applications for process control systems.
Update: Found this discussion which might be some help...
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I was just about to suggest that as an add-on to my earlier answer! If he went for the new Pi4 with 2 or 4 GB of RAM he would have quite a reasonable alternative to a NUC. And cheap too!
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How did you hang it?
For those who have never worked with an Elo touchscreen, they can be a little finicky.
https://support.elotouch.com/TechnicalSupport/Hardware/usb_to_serial/
This is what I use for running HomeAssistant and some miscellaneous things I want to keep separate.
Two RAM slots, kinda decent processor, serial and VGA. I think I got it on some crazy sale for 100 bucks a year ago.
There are also many Qotom industrial PCs available on eBay/Aliexpress for reasonable prices - I use one of these as my router. They are very well built.
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This looks interesting - serial and VGA. Just needs a drive?
I believe I have tried to get these touchscreens running on Windows 10 and had no luck.
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