“This has always been something that’s intrigued me, and is just a part of my life. People come in here, and I say, yeah, I’ve got three computers in the living room.” So says Pete Freeman, creator, designer and builder of some very special furniture. He’s taken a simple concept like a side table, and turned it into a “stealth computer”, allowing the owner to to completely hide the computer out of sight for when it’s not needed, but have it easily accessible for when you want to use it.
Why would you want to do this? Pete answers with a couple examples, illustrating the benefits of having a convenient and unobtrusive home technology center.
Pete Freeman: I’m at my dentist, he just got his first computer. His wife said, “You’re not putting that upstairs – that’s going in the basement. I’m not having that ugly thing upstairs in my house.” So it went in the basement. [Or, for example,] you’re watching TV. “Check this out on ‘discovery.com’! You’ve gotta run back to your office to check out discovery.com, and you’re missing the show. With this, you can either go to discovery.com on the same screen that you’re watching Discovery, or I’ve got it right here on the sofa. …I can surf the Net with this. In fact, I’ve got pictures of my daughter, when she was little. And here she is, watching Nick, and she’s at nick.com here, and she was bouncing around, she just thought this was the greatest, playing this and watching TV.
Say you don’t want full home-theater computer integration, and just want a place to work on a PC. Why not just use laptops and tablets? Because they’re easier to break (even more common in houses with children):
Pete Freeman: Now, I’ve seen in the auto industry, insurance adjustors using tablets. Doctors in hospitals I could see as tablet users. But really, other than that, it’s just not something you want to be dragging around. You still drop it, and it’s still broken! And it’s a Big Expensive broken!
Perhaps the most subtle yet most functional of Pete Freeman’s creations is his computer-integrated side table.
Pull open the top drawer, and you’ll find a LCD monitor nicely tucked away. Flip it up, rotate it toward you, and get to work!
The bottom drawer provides storage for a wireless mouse, keyboard, and peripherals like a CD/DVD drive.
Fold down the monitor, put the keyboard and mouse in a drawer, close everything up, and you’re left with a very nice piece of furniture. The mini-desktop computer unit itself is mounted at the bottom of the case, and is easily accessible by a panel (in the picture below, the panel is behind the bottom row of books):
While Pete would like to market this as high-end custom furniture, he’s worried it’s a little too new, or what he’s doing is just enough out of the ordinary that people don’t see the benefit at first. To roll this out into mass production (specifically for the computer hardware) would require help.
Pete Freeman: …I’ve got plenty of places around Grand Rapids that’ll build it, as far as furniture. …It’s the computer issue. I can’t support nationwide distribution of the computer hardware. And this is so chopped up, it’s not a conventional configuration. So that was my whole problem. I’d have to team up with a computer company to do this. And I thought Gateway would be perfect, you know, because Gateway has so fallen off the spectrum, they could use something – instead of trying to compete with the run-of-the-mill, everyday computers, why not go up there like Alienware and build high-end systems, and find a niche. And this would be a niche product.
Andy: In terms of finding any kind of a market or producer for the internal components, do you see it as being something very customized, where someone is going to have to develop hardware that can be mass-produced for this kind of application?
Pete Freeman: It’s a standard PC down there. It’s all standard components. What I did unique about this was the case is actually laying with the motherboard upside down, facing down, and the whole idea is to keep dust from settling on it. And then I’ve got the copper heat sinks that were just the big radial fins, and they’ve got a large, 120 half-speed fan underneath it, blowing at it. You can’t see it – it’s all underneath. And then I’ve got silent industrial fans in the back that are speed-controlled, so you don’t even hear the fans. The air comes up from the bottom and is drawn out the back.
Andy: So what you’ve designed is the entire unit? Or just the shelving?
Pete Freeman: It was actually the entire complete unit. And really, my patent attorney said “this probably isn’t the one we should be focusing on. This is. [He’s now referring to the end table.] There is nothing close to this out there. … This is all my design. I built the mount. I’m a fabricator right now.
Pete Freeman: So you’ve got the controls for the computer. There’s your CD drive. And everything being wireless… You’ve got the mount you can pull out. And this – the market for this is like the suites on hotel rooms. You could have an extra one by the bed as a nightstand, or put a chair next to it so they can work on it.
Pete Freeman: And on the sides, these are all vents that are designed to let air through, for cooling, to deal with heat. And underneath, the back is all opened up to let heat through, and there’s slight venting at the top, it’s basically a convection, so there’s no active fans in there other than the silent fan on the power supply and on the box. And now with the new Micro ATX, we can go even smaller: Less heat.
Andy: In terms of the actual fabrication work, you’ve obviously had to design for heat dissipation. What other computer-specific issues or problems have you had?
Pete Freeman: It’s just mostly, well, getting a monitor that folds down into a drawer! I remember when I first called ViewSonic, I was telling them I made a mount that you can put your monitor in a drawer, and they’re like, “Why would you want to do that?” And then when I sent them a picture, they were like, “Well… How do you sit at it?” I said, “It’s not a desk, it’s an end table. You sit next to it.” And they sent someone out here to look at this stuff, and they were like, “Oh!” This is when they were teaming up with the tablets, because they were big tablet builders back five years ago.
Andy: ViewSonic?
Pete Freeman: Yeah, they had two tablets. One was a small one, and then a large one, then they were paired up with Microsoft at the time to push this whole tablet thing. And I’m like, “People don’t want tablets.” And they didn’t want to hear that, because they’ve dumped a lot of R&D into tablets. And where are tablets today? If you can’t stick it in your pocket, who wants it?
Below we have a picture of Pete’s custom-made, computer-integrated entertainment center. You’ll notice a wireless keyboard and mouse setting on the left lower shelf. The PC unit itself is contained inside the lower right shelf.
Pete Freeman: This is a theater that someone could have with them, self-contained, surround sound, and when it’s time to move, they can take it with. The whole idea I was looking at was getting away from the whole entertainment center being a cabinet, or shelves or whatever. This is totally open, all the wires hidden, sort of changing the paradigm of an entertainment center.
An “action shot” of the entertainment center, showing a Windows desktop.
A third view. Notice the lack of cabling. This is because Pete designed the unit with optical illusions in mind: The shelves expand into wedge-shaped pieces towards the back of the unit. Inside the thickest part of the wedge, Pete has recessed grooves to hold the wiring. The result is a clean, minimalist, non-techie, yet high-tech setup. It’s capable of hiding the required cabling while looking streamlined.
For those who like to sit comfortably, Pete has integrated a computer into a couch. Specifically, He’s mounted an LCD monitor on a movable stand, set up a wireless keyboard and mouse, and installed a vertically-loading DVD burner within the armrest. The computer itself is separate from the couch, and is actually located in another room, thanks to some ingenious wiring.
This is a closeup of the monitor and DVD burner unit. (The couch armrest is pivoted up. In the picture above it’s pivoted down.)
Cabling leading from the couch leads us to the house wiring, including long cable runs to the desktop unit, located 20-30 feet away.
The couch computer also manages the room projector.
The projector is nicely hidden when not in use. Recessed into the wall, it’s completely unobtrusive. When you need to use it, just swing the picture out of the way. (I should’ve asked what was under the rest of the photos!)
The projector screen drops down from the ceiling. While it takes up room when unrolled, it ascends back into the ceiling and is completely out of the way. While I think I’m a fairly observant guy, I didn’t even notice the screen slot cut into Pete’s ceiling. Pete and I were in the room talking for a while, before he pointed the screen out to me.
Andy: So have you named any of your creations?
Pete Freeman: I got as far as getting a trademark for “Fuzon”. But I didn’t have this marketed in other states, or whatever, and it was an expensive exercise in futility. I’m a tech guy, not a business [guy], so I was like okay, I’m really kind of stuck here. What do I do? I’m afraid of just going out. I was talking with [popular company name removed] about making this mount here, and then everyone warned me, “Don’t talk to them – They’re masters at stealing things.” And then we were going to go to one of the trade shows, and my attorney’s like, “Not till we get this patent worked on. You’re going to get companies from around the world doing R&D down there: ‘Rip-off and duplicate’. And you’re going to lose it all.”
Pete Freeman: And also, the market wasn’t ready. People back then – I was a member of the Home Building Association. I was telling these guys at Classic Stereo, “This is the future.” They thought I was an idiot. People want components. They want something they can touch. “Yeah, but this is digital. It’s upgradable!” They don’t want to hear that.
I asked Pete if anyone else has shown interest in his work.
Pete Freeman: There are some. There was a doctor, a cardiologist. I networked his house a couple winters ago. And he was like, “Yeah, that’s how I want it – when I build my house, I want it like your house. So there’s people out there who think this is a pretty cool thing, but I think it gets back to the idea that theaters are some big fancy room. But this is our living room. When the theater goes away, it tucks neatly into the walls. It’s not obtrusive, it can still just be a living room.
Andy: Are you doing active marketing for this now?
Pete Freeman: No. I’ve done really nothing with it, because I don’t know where to go with it. I have no clue. So that’s why after reading your columns, I thought “Wonder what he’d think of this stuff?”
Andy: I love it.
Pete Freeman: Most people don’t get it, though. I’ve had people in here, and they look at it, and “Yeah, it’s cool”, but it takes a certain type to really understand and appreciate it.
Andy: Does the confusion stem from this being too different?
Pete Freeman: It’s too different. … I was just talking to a musician I know, and he said, “I just bought a brand new bass, and when I was playing in the band, they thought I wasn’t playing it! They couldn’t hear the bass because they didn’t know the sound. And after he’d been playing it for a while, then they could start hearing it. Even though he’s playing it just as loud as before, it wasn’t a sound that they knew, so their brain couldn’t recognize it.
Pete Freeman: I think the same thing is here. It’s so foreign. I mean now with plasma TVs, people go, “Plasma. Oh, okay.” But that’s not a plasma TV. That’s a computer that you can surf the Net, play games, do whatever you want on it, and yeah, we watch TV on it too. We watch movies on it. And same with the end table there. …Look, you’re around [technology]. You’re used to seeing it. You’re used to making it a part of your life. So when you see this stuff, it clicks. Most people aren’t around it, so they see it as a TV set. That’s all they see. And until they see it and know it, they’re not going to recognize it. Now, granted, it’s more mainstream now, but… In your sofa?!
Andy: Further development? Other topics of interest or projects you’re working on? Where are you going from here?
Pete Freeman: This really isn’t the market. Chicago, New York, L.A., those are where everyone says, that’s where people would be hungry for this stuff. Well, I’m in Michigan, you know? And I’m just not a business person. I’m so scared of getting ripped off. And I’ve dumped tons of money into the patent work. It’s still in the patent office. The conditional patent was first published in 2002. And it’s been published – all the drawings and everything were published. They did all the research on it – there was nothing [similar] out there when they were doing the patent search. So I’m good to go, but I don’t know what to do. But right now, the patent is focusing on that one there [indicating the end table] – cause they said choose between the two, and they said that’s the one I should be going with, because that’s the most unique.
Andy: How much money have you spent on the design and production of your living room components? How much time have you spent?
Pete Freeman: It was about $35K on the end table and entertainment center. If you add the sofa and theater components, it would be closer to $45K and that doesn’t include my time. As far as how much time went into it, it would be hard to judge as I am a thinking junkie and there is probably hundreds of hours of thought poured into each project. I tend to think through each process and “test” them in my head so as to see all possible outcomes and look for weaknesses before committing resources. Being poor keeps the budget tight and luckily I haven’t had to “scrap” anything that I have built (or had built). And all we have is a really cool living room. And our attempts trying to get into Gateway didn’t work. Whoever we’ve looked at, we just don’t know who to turn to to be able to do this kind of thing.
Andy: You’re married. You have kids. And a full time job. You’ve obviously spent a lot of effort on all these projects. How do you do it?
Pete Freeman: I don’t sleep much!