Car Pc

[Aero]

Ok, first let me say that this forum kicks ass. I mean an IDEA forum! SWEET. Anyway I was wondering if anyone had any tips for making a Car PC. I went to Best Buy today and my friend was looking at those LCD's that fit in you CD player and fold out, but they cost like $1100! I told him I could do something similar for about $300-400. So I think I'm going to make him a Car PC this summer. Just wondering if anyone had any tis on how to plan for this. What I need, etc.

[crenn]

Goto www.mini-itx.com you can get enough ideas from there to see what you need to do it. As for a folding out LCD screen, you need to buy/build that your self!!

[Aero]

cool, thanks crenn.

anyway what I'm thinking of is a 5-6 inch LCD (touchscreen if possible) in the dash somehow. I need to get some pictures from inside his car to figure everything out though. But right now I'm thinking of a stationary LCD and hooking the PC up to his speakers. Proboly about a 40 gig HDD, or whatever I can find cheap, he won't need much. Around the LCD I'm thinking about a styrene border (1/8 inch thick), and painted yellow (he has a yellow cobalt).

[Rankenphile]

I found a great in-car mod work-log for these guys getting ready to go to MML a few months back and can't remember the address or the site it was on... I'll do some digging, if I have time.

[crenn]

The site I gave you has a 7" widescreen LCD touchscreen. But you can most likely find something that can hide in the dash. As for hooking the PC upto his speakers.... that should be too much of a problem if you know how to rig it.
One last thing, try to get a laptop HDD, but at least a 5400rpm, that way it will be prefect and should avoid 'shock' bumps..... unless you want to go for a SSD!!

[Xato]

Just get everything small form factor. And thats a lot of things these days;
PSU
Mobo
HDD
CD Drive

You could even get a low profile graphics card for it, it he plans to expand his system to play games etc.

Yeh and for the speaker system, you should be able to hook an output right into his headdeck. If he has a decent one that is.

[OvRiDe]

I found a great in-car mod work-log for these guys getting ready to go to MML a few months back and can't remember the address or the site it was on... I'll do some digging, if I have time.

I think you may be referring to Magnum PC .. its on Gruntville.com here
He did a really nice job..

There are tons of examples and pictures etc at MP3Car

And for software one of the best I have seen is FrodoPlayer
I messed around with it and its pretty slick...

[crazybillybob]

mini-box.com Sells All ITX parts (PSU, Indash LCD, MOBo's,Cases, ETC)

viaarena.com How to build a car PC Article
VIA Article on makeing a Car PC. (very cool, but still running so you've gotta keep going back for updates!)

There are sevral books that go indepth on makeing a car PC check them out (they are listed @ Via arena.com)

I plan on working with a VIA mini ITX board in the near future for my R2 mod, check there in the coming months to see more!


Good Luck,
Crazybillybob