Reconnecting a detached laptop display with an extension cable?

[sallly_mander]

So, I have an old Dell Inspiron N5110 and I had to detach the top half from the bottom half due to broken plastic and hinge problems. I currently still use the bottom half as a computer just fine - it's on a desk attached to a big external monitor. I had a weird idea: I want to build a small mount/stand for the display half of the laptop to prop it up, then connect it to the bottom half (via its original connection) from a few inches away, as if it was an external monitor. Basically, get an extension cable of some kind and connect it into the laptop in the original port, then have the cable run out of a hole in the plastic case [pictured], and simply attach it to the connector on the display assembly whenever I want to use it.

I mostly want the option to bring this computer into another room in my house easily without having to lug a giant monitor with me or have old monitors scattered throughout the house. I'm not really worried about having an exposed ribbon cable (unless I should be?) because this laptop never leaves my house. The extension wouldn't even have to be that far, only a couple inches.

So my questions for y'alls are:
(1) Is this even possible to do with some sort of cable? I assume it would be like many other connections, but I don't know enough about this sort of thing
(2) If so, what is this cable called? Where can I buy this? What do I search for? Searching for things that included "Dell N5110 display cable" (as Microcenter suggested) just got me the replacement internal hardware, not a cable...

I've attached some photos of my laptop halves and some sketches I drew of what I'm envisioning. Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Darren]

Don't bother. I used to repair laptops, especially screens. Those cables are pretty delicate and not meant to be exposed to anything. In fact they're usually taped down in place. They have 30-40 individual pins and if a single one is bent or broken, you're toast.

Get another monitor or a new laptop. This isn't worth the effort and ultimately will not work how you want. I don't think you could even find an LCD cable that's longer than what goes from the laptop motherboard to the LCD, when the laptop is assembled properly.

You could maybe leverage a USB to video adapter for basic video output, you'd still need a monitor. Going with the internal LCD cable is not going to work.

 

[beers]

There's not going to be any off the shelf component that will do what you're looking to do.

It'd probably make more sense to just repair/replace the hinge and return it to being an actual laptop, if you wanted to use it in desktop mode you could connect a USB hub with your peripherals and use the VGA out, similar to a dock, and is the type of setup I use.