I built a prototype of a tablet sleeve that would allow me to use my Surface without taking it out of my bag; just plugging in my Xreal glasses and having a wireless keyboard, I could turn almost anywhere into a workspace.  It feels like this would amp up my travel productivity, but everything in the marketplace is a massive contraption intended for VR users, not ultralight one-bag travellers.

It’s made of that corrugated plastic paneling they make yard signs from, welded into a box that I drop the tablet into.  I built it such that there is an open air plenum at the bottom, about 30mm deep, where the inside face of the plastic panels have been cut away to allow the air in the plenum to escape through the channels to the top of the sleeve. By leaving the top of the backpack/ briefcase open, it could facilitate the movement of cool air into the tablet vents, down into the plenum, and back up through the air channels. 

I tried it out on a 3-day airline trip, but the passive air circulation was clearly not cutting it, and eventually the thermal throttling would kick in. I decided to add a fan, finding one the same thickness was as the panels, and installing it into one side panel with a USB cable pigtailed out to a power bank.  

So far this one seems to be working pretty well; I haven’t yet experienced any throttling after a few hours working out of the backpack. The fan pushes air out through about a dozen of the channels, and has decent flow and pressure; I can feel the warm air coming out of the top of my bag when it is running. 

I think the next version I may try to incorporate a Surface charging plug into the bottom of the sleeve, to magnetically attach when I drop the tablet in.  Then I can have a power bank that will provide power to both the fan and the tablet, which will keep me running all day, and never have to find an outlet or plug anything in.

The hardest part is making sure that the heated exhaust actually gets out of the bag, as it seems there are plenty of avenues for cooler air to infiltrate into the bag and find its way to the plenum. I thought maybe making the exhaust stack taller than the rest of the sleeve so it could be closer to or protrude from the top of my bag; also, maybe there is a more flexible version of the poly panels I am using that could be used to really customize a travel bag.

What other cool things could I add to the next version?



So I made a thing…