Carputer Fully Running off battery and screen fitted in. (Video included)
#52
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as for suspending hard drive in the air, its not good at all, take an old hard drive that no longer reads and make it spin up, then un plug it and turn it, you can feal the G force and here the heads making awful sounds. its funny to do that with a scsy drive at 10000RPm its like a ufo, it catualy floats for 2 seconds lol
#53
Hey,
Sorry for the semi late reply, but this can all be done through the computer. It can be done through the basic "Volume Control on your task bar" You will always see the left/right side, but if you go into properties, you can add front/rear/center, usually they won't be enabled till you select that you have atleast 5.1 audio hooked up to you computer and not just headphones as most computer are.
There are a few dedicated programs that you can dowload too, I think if you have a creative sound card they have a program to do that and probably more too.
And then for everything else ... you have equalizers in almost any computer audio programs, so that would be your bass/treble/ and other things controls.
Sorry for the semi late reply, but this can all be done through the computer. It can be done through the basic "Volume Control on your task bar" You will always see the left/right side, but if you go into properties, you can add front/rear/center, usually they won't be enabled till you select that you have atleast 5.1 audio hooked up to you computer and not just headphones as most computer are.
There are a few dedicated programs that you can dowload too, I think if you have a creative sound card they have a program to do that and probably more too.
And then for everything else ... you have equalizers in almost any computer audio programs, so that would be your bass/treble/ and other things controls.
#54
Sorry for posting late to this thread. The desktop hdd is the way to go as they are less expensive and work exceedingly well if you hard mount them to the case. Now if you were running this in an offroad condition then you could look toward a cf type storage system or another solid state setup. That would be very pricey though.
There is another option if your board allows it and that is to have the os boot from cf or some other high speed solid state memory and then store media on a hdd. You would then have shortened boot times bringing you closer to the headunit operation (ie short boot/startup times) the world is so accustomed to. As for the power supply look for a unit designed for the car environment as they have systems in place to deal with the power draw during starting, as well as properly shutting down after the 7 is shut off.
Toxic_d
There is another option if your board allows it and that is to have the os boot from cf or some other high speed solid state memory and then store media on a hdd. You would then have shortened boot times bringing you closer to the headunit operation (ie short boot/startup times) the world is so accustomed to. As for the power supply look for a unit designed for the car environment as they have systems in place to deal with the power draw during starting, as well as properly shutting down after the 7 is shut off.
Toxic_d
#55
Sorry for posting late to this thread. The desktop hdd is the way to go as they are less expensive and work exceedingly well if you hard mount them to the case. Now if you were running this in an offroad condition then you could look toward a cf type storage system or another solid state setup. That would be very pricey though.
There is another option if your board allows it and that is to have the os boot from cf or some other high speed solid state memory and then store media on a hdd. You would then have shortened boot times bringing you closer to the headunit operation (ie short boot/startup times) the world is so accustomed to. As for the power supply look for a unit designed for the car environment as they have systems in place to deal with the power draw during starting, as well as properly shutting down after the 7 is shut off.
Toxic_d
There is another option if your board allows it and that is to have the os boot from cf or some other high speed solid state memory and then store media on a hdd. You would then have shortened boot times bringing you closer to the headunit operation (ie short boot/startup times) the world is so accustomed to. As for the power supply look for a unit designed for the car environment as they have systems in place to deal with the power draw during starting, as well as properly shutting down after the 7 is shut off.
Toxic_d
As for the USB, I will be trying those out too. I'm pretty sure that my board handles it. Also another interesting thing too that I found out while reading is that now there are some Hybrid Drives as they call them. As in they already have 128/256/512 MB of flash ram preinstalled on there and you could intall windows to load up just from that, and you could also allow that part to be recorded on to first and loaded up from first.
#57
Ya everything will be fused. There will be a kill switch from the inbetween the line of the battery to the power supply too. I'm going to try to not turn it on till the car is booted up. The fuse holder that i bought is from Centech (thanks to directfreak for posting up the picture) and will also handle the new fuses for all the relaying minus the headlight (those will be 2 seperate 30Amp holders inline for each relay).
Also all the other quipment like the screen and stuff will also be hooked up to the 12V line of the power supply. So if anything is going to fail it would only be the Power supply, which wouldn't be too expensive to get another one or I could even probably just fix the burnt out part.
Also all the other quipment like the screen and stuff will also be hooked up to the 12V line of the power supply. So if anything is going to fail it would only be the Power supply, which wouldn't be too expensive to get another one or I could even probably just fix the burnt out part.
#61
lol .. i've seen maybe 20 cars with them on lol .. not original at all ... thanks to the world wide web ... if you think of something its probably already done ... if you google it and can't find it .. better get it up and running because you'll be rich
#62
the most recent mag of Popular Science i got, had an article where they put together a super cheap computer for like 57$ using a cheap board, ram, and had everything boot off of a cheap flash drive with a very small version of linux. As long as you got a USB drive, you can boot from it. I think that would be the best way to go, no spinning discs, and then all your music could be stored on a seperate drive if you would want. If you got an ipod already use that, then you can update it whenever you want, and remove anything important from your car. i would hope there are some linux based carputer programs out there.
#63
you can build a computer as cheap or as expensive as you want ... and its been brough up before, not all boards support USB bootup. But if it does, its great.
As far as Ipods, don't even get me started on those ... I'm one of the biggest ipod haters out there... the only reason they sell is because its the only things thats advertised largely. Very poor built quality (seriously who glues end pieces on a nano, that's suppose to be the rednecks job that tries to fix it) and one of the crappiest battery lifes. If you want something thats good all around creative is one of the better names i think, If you want ultimate battery life go sony (i know some people hate the software). I deal alot with portable electronics, and i love when people come up to me and ask me for ipods, and then you direct them to the "mp3 player section" and you tell them all about a good player, only at the end to tell you " Oh, so its like an ipod". Sony and creative have very good reasons to not to advertise as much and thats due to the music recording business, and movie business money. Which can yield them far more than a few mp3 players. Glad to get that off my chest ... lol
As far as Ipods, don't even get me started on those ... I'm one of the biggest ipod haters out there... the only reason they sell is because its the only things thats advertised largely. Very poor built quality (seriously who glues end pieces on a nano, that's suppose to be the rednecks job that tries to fix it) and one of the crappiest battery lifes. If you want something thats good all around creative is one of the better names i think, If you want ultimate battery life go sony (i know some people hate the software). I deal alot with portable electronics, and i love when people come up to me and ask me for ipods, and then you direct them to the "mp3 player section" and you tell them all about a good player, only at the end to tell you " Oh, so its like an ipod". Sony and creative have very good reasons to not to advertise as much and thats due to the music recording business, and movie business money. Which can yield them far more than a few mp3 players. Glad to get that off my chest ... lol
#66
Engine, Not Motor
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In fact I'd go so far as to say that the capacitor is unnecessary unless you are experiencing low voltage problems during startup. And if that's the case, it's the battery and wiring that should be checked instead of bandaiding the problem. The key is to set up a proper aux fuse box in the car that gets it's feed via a thick gauge (8 gauge) from the battery (through a breaker, of course) and then run all you accessories from it.
#68
Power during startup is not as big a deal as people think. For a lot of years I used an Arise 865V DC-DC power supply in the RX-7. I used a manual on/off switch mounted below the stereo that would switch a relay in the player to supply or cut power to the supply. In the morning I would turn the player on and basically leave it on all day since it was easier then turning it on and off (and waiting for the bootup). Starting the car with the player running was never a big deal.
In fact I'd go so far as to say that the capacitor is unnecessary unless you are experiencing low voltage problems during startup. And if that's the case, it's the battery and wiring that should be checked instead of bandaiding the problem. The key is to set up a proper aux fuse box in the car that gets it's feed via a thick gauge (8 gauge) from the battery (through a breaker, of course) and then run all you accessories from it.
In fact I'd go so far as to say that the capacitor is unnecessary unless you are experiencing low voltage problems during startup. And if that's the case, it's the battery and wiring that should be checked instead of bandaiding the problem. The key is to set up a proper aux fuse box in the car that gets it's feed via a thick gauge (8 gauge) from the battery (through a breaker, of course) and then run all you accessories from it.
#69
Carputer Fully Running off battery and screen fitted in. (Video included)
So finally got a chance to get everything up and running just off the car battery. I've got a case somewhat done ... 20$CA for the whole thing just had to cut it and shape it beats paying 60 bucks for something else.
Anyways the screen as mentioned is actually fully in. It fits in just snugly, but will still be fastened from the back side somehow. I have plenty of clearance in the back which is always good for ventilation. Also more room for wiring.
As soon as i find my voltmeter, i would like to run a test to see how many amps the whole system is actually drawing. That would be an interesting piece of information to know if alternators should be upgraded. I will do a run with the screen on and off as thats one thing that we can control too.
Also I would like to get a very small amp around 200-250W something that i can fit behind the screen area somewhere to power up the speakers. Less wiring mess then going to the back and should work. So if you know of a good 4 channel amp that would sneak behind there let me know.
As for the voltmeter actually it went back to working when i disconnected it and reconnected it, it must have like a time delay when to shut off or something.
Now for the good stuff, here's the little video uploaded on youtube of everything running:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj9wqoaJo8g
Also i have attached a few pics of things
Anyways the screen as mentioned is actually fully in. It fits in just snugly, but will still be fastened from the back side somehow. I have plenty of clearance in the back which is always good for ventilation. Also more room for wiring.
As soon as i find my voltmeter, i would like to run a test to see how many amps the whole system is actually drawing. That would be an interesting piece of information to know if alternators should be upgraded. I will do a run with the screen on and off as thats one thing that we can control too.
Also I would like to get a very small amp around 200-250W something that i can fit behind the screen area somewhere to power up the speakers. Less wiring mess then going to the back and should work. So if you know of a good 4 channel amp that would sneak behind there let me know.
As for the voltmeter actually it went back to working when i disconnected it and reconnected it, it must have like a time delay when to shut off or something.
Now for the good stuff, here's the little video uploaded on youtube of everything running:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj9wqoaJo8g
Also i have attached a few pics of things
Last edited by dj55b; 06-19-07 at 12:53 AM.
#73
guages won't happen till the MS is hooked up so could a while before that happen. The touchscreen is working perfectly. Once I reformat and reinstall windows lite on there to reduce boot time more, I will be installing road runner most likely. Maybe I'll get some time to do so tomorrow. I'll see.
Sam
Sam