A little how to for Car PC

[SupraDerk]

Ok, so it's all pretty simple. First here's a small list of tools that'll make things go smoothly...

Tools:
------
1) Soldering Iron $9.99ish
2) Rosin core solder $3.00
3) Wire, I used red and black 18 guage and 14 gauge speaker wire for power to my amp and they were like $6 each for the 18 and $10 for the 14
4) Regular hand tools, screwdrivers, wrench, etc...


Items for PC:
-------------
1) Remember this is a Car PC...not a gaming rig or Overclocking monster so you don't need a Super Mega 512-bit AMD-INTEL Devil Spawn processor...something around 1ghz is more than enough to run music, video, engine management stuff at a quick pace. These can be had on ebay ... mainboard and processor for like $40-50.

2) RAM is pretty cheap now $30-40 for 256mb to 1gig of slower stuff, but you don't need lightning fast ram. 200-300 mhz is good.

3) A DVD ROM is about $30 or $40 and then you have a cheap DVD player and cd player.

4) Some kind of screen, I managed to get one on ebay for like $40...it's a TFT LCD...kind of an all purpose screen that I made to fit this application.
Any screen that'll except RCA or VGA input is good.

5) A graphics card, these are dirt ...dirt cheap. I'm runnin a Geforce FX 5200 in mine.

6) And then your inputs, I'm tryin to find a touchpad...you can find them for like $15 and a foldable keyboard...maybe like $10-15 on ebay

7) If you plan on running sound from the PC to the car's speakers then you will need an amplifier. I got a 4 channel one on ebay for $15.

8) And finally a DC to AC power inverter unless you put the money down for a 12-volt power supply, they're kind of expensive.

9) Oh actually, if your mainboard doesn't have more than 2 channels and you want more, a 5 channel sound card can be bought for like $20

10) If you go the PC to car speaker route you'll need to either buy (I don't even know where to find them) or make headphone jack to RCA cables. It's easy, PM me if you have any problems.

11) Two things from the stock radio come in handy, the faceplate and the harness adapter on the back (the white adapter)...just dismantle the radio and then cut this adapter out, you'll have to break the breadboard but make sure you still have the bottom pieces where the adapter was soldered to the breadboard, makes soldering A LOT easier.

12) A harddrive would probably come in handy too, hah


Guidelines
----------
1) Make sure everything is in a well ventilated place cause it'll run hotter in the car than in the house ...well mine does thanks to the loverly Florida heat and humidity.

2) Make sure all of your wiring is CORRECT before you add any power. If you solder joints make sure you have electrical tape handy to cover the solders so nothing grounds out.

3) TSRM for the wiring diagram

4) For ease, use the old radio adapter and solder the new wiries to it...run it from the amp to the stock wiring connector


That's basically all I'll say, I kind of want it to be unique and force those interested to research some. That'll hopefully weed out those that would potentially half ass it. If you have any questions and have done some searching on your own, hit me up and I'll try to help you out.

-Derek

[87centertips]

thats awsome i was wondering were can i find all these part very intrested in this project

[supra90turbo]

thats awsome i was wondering were can i find all these part very intrested in this project
Yeah, I mean, he only said eBay like 6 or 7 times.... I'm wondering as well :icon_conf

Nice job so far Derk. Looks like you know what you're doing there. CarPC's are awesome and I can't wait to build mine!
So much for weeding out the lazy...

[wingman]

I'm actually strongly considering this for when I go with the AEM EMS, that way i can adjust settings on the fly and not lug around a laptop in the backseat.

i'm not a computer whiz, so do you think a laptop with 1.2GHz on the processor and 512mb of ram would be capable of running music, EMS programs, and datalogging all at once? I'm not too hip on the DVD thing, Probably slap the EMS disc in there and leave it...of course I won't be using the friggin huge stock screen, just the mini ones like everyone else. Hmm I've got a WiFi card too so wardriving isn't as suspicious!

[bigaaron]

One word of advice, if you use a monitor without a vga input the text will be blurry and almost unreadable when running windows on a 7" screen.
The cheapest decent vga 7" widescreen monitor is a little over $250.
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Lilliput-7-Touch-Screen-TFT-LCD-car-VGA-Monitor_W0QQitemZ8825376807QQihZ005QQcategoryZ3698QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

You are also much better off using a mini itx case with a 12v atx power supply. These two items together are around $160
Like this:
http://www.mini-box.com/s.nl/sc.8/category.87/it.A/id.373/.f
http://www.mini-box.com/s.nl/category.13/it.A/id.424/.f

Mobo:
http://www.via.com.tw/en/products/mainboards/motherboards.jsp?motherboard_id=81

Laptop or PC running off an inverter is prone to give you noise or 60hz hum when used with a car stereo or amplifer.

www.mini-box.com is a cool place to check out what is available in the world of car pc's.

[SupraDerk]

I'm running it off an inverter now and then having the sound go through an amplifier and I have no noise or the 60hz hum.

But yeah, RCA input = text a little bit blurry, if you have enough patience though you can mess with some of the Desktop Resolution programs that often come with new graphics cards or are available from the manufacturer's webstie and fine tune it. Just have a VGA monitor handy to plug into the graphics card so that you're able to read what's going on while making changes on the small screen.

I'm actually strongly considering this for when I go with the AEM EMS, that way i can adjust settings on the fly and not lug around a laptop in the backseat.

i'm not a computer whiz, so do you think a laptop with 1.2GHz on the processor and 512mb of ram would be capable of running music, EMS programs, and datalogging all at once? I'm not too hip on the DVD thing, Probably slap the EMS disc in there and leave it...of course I won't be using the friggin huge stock screen, just the mini ones like everyone else. Hmm I've got a WiFi card too so wardriving isn't as suspicious!

I don't think you should have any problems. The only problem I forsee is if you have them all running onscreen together and you're switching back and forth between them like a madman. Then it'll probably get bogged down, but 512mb of ram should help you out. But it being a 1.2ghz processor in a laptop I'm willing to be it's a little old and probably runs really hot, so cooling will probably be your biggest hurdle.

[MassSupra89]

10) If you go the PC to car speaker route you'll need to either buy (I don't even know where to find them) or make headphone jack to RCA cables. It's easy, PM me if you have any problems.
-Derek

I've got a generic 6' headphone jack-to-RCA cable from Radioshack for about 12 bucks. You can find more expensive name brand ones at Best Buy in the Car and Home audio sections. I used it to plug my tv into my surround sound controller, and it also worked to plug my Ipod directly into my amp.

Great write-up, I wish I had everything else I want to get done already so I could start this project.

[SupraDerk]

I've got a generic 6' headphone jack-to-RCA cable from Radioshack for about 12 bucks. You can find more expensive name brand ones at Best Buy in the Car and Home audio sections. I used it to plug my tv into my surround sound controller, and it also worked to plug my Ipod directly into my amp.

Sweet! There you go, haha, I guess I probably should have checked there...but you live you learn I guess.

Great write-up, I wish I had everything else I want to get done already so I could start this project.

Thanks! I kind of forgot to mention, but...ask around with friends or schools that are often getting rid of "old" computers and parts. You'd be surprised where you find computers at these days...FOR FREE. That's where my brother just got his, now we're working on his set :naughty:

[MassSupra89]

Yea I'm looking for laptops with broken screens that someone might want to get rid of cheap and use that with the liliput touchpad.

[bigal0043]

hey supraderk got any pics of it up and running? see the problem i can see with having a computer running in the car is when you shut off the car you have to manually shutdown the pc before turning off your car... its not a good idea to kill power on it before doing a shutdown..

[bigaaron]

hey supraderk got any pics of it up and running? see the problem i can see with having a computer running in the car is when you shut off the car you have to manually shutdown the pc before turning off your car... its not a good idea to kill power on it before doing a shutdown..

m2-atx power supply has auto startup and shutdown, along with a low battery shutdown. There are higher wattage power supplies out there also.

[bigal0043]

oh that it really cool

[Jaguar_5]

I think he means the reverse situation you just described, running the laptop regardless of the broken screen, and run the vga output to the liliput as the display!

I definitely plan on doing this, once my rebuild is done!

[s383mmber1]

Supraderk, i think you should make one for me.

I would pay very very nicely.

Seriously, pm me!

[tekdeus]

I can get a huge 300 or 400 GB hard drive for like $200. I sick of CD's and mp3 discs, I just want to have my entire library on a hard drive and have easy access. Anyone doing this now??? What's the easiest interface?

[SupraDerk]

Tekdeus: You doing a car pc? or you just want to figure out some way to get music from a harddrive to a HU?

If you're doing car pc then it's really easy, either make it your primary harddrive and just transfer info to and from it via a jumpdrive or cd's...or you could just get an external usb harddrive and connect it to the pc whenever you're in the car.

Or you could go this route and get a HU that has a USB port and connect a jumpdrive or usb harddrive to it...
http://cgi.ebay.com/CAR-Stereo-CD-MP3-WMA-USB-PLAYER-Head-Unit-NEW-for-2006_W0QQitemZ7629344905QQihZ017QQcategoryZ18798QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

-Derek

[bigaaron]

You can put a wifi card in the car pc and transfer music over your wireless network. Or, put the car pc hard drive in your home pc as a slave and transfer the mp3's, then put it back in the car.

[MassSupra89]

I was wondering alittle about FM radio. Aaron and Supraderk what do you use for radio reception? Is it wired into the stock antenna (will the antenna still go up and down with the radio on or off?)
I was just wondering how I would get FM through the computer and wanted to know what you guys did.

[bigaaron]

I was wondering alittle about FM radio. Aaron and Supraderk what do you use for radio reception? Is it wired into the stock antenna (will the antenna still go up and down with the radio on or off?)
I was just wondering how I would get FM through the computer and wanted to know what you guys did.

There are inexpensive usb and pci radio tuners out there for under $50.

[WeDgE]

I'm selling a complete CarPC if anyone is interested...

[rakkasan]

I'm selling a complete CarPC if anyone is interested...

Send me a PM with the details, please.....:icon_bigg

[tekdeus]

Thanks for the info SupraDerk, a head unit that can read off a portable USB drive just makes so much sense. Any other better quality brand names that have this feature? I saw something similar on Alpine decks but it seemed geared towards Ipods. I'd like to stick a cheap portable 300 gig usb drive in my center console which would fit my entire CD library with CD quality!

Tekdeus: You doing a car pc? or you just want to figure out some way to get music from a harddrive to a HU?

If you're doing car pc then it's really easy, either make it your primary harddrive and just transfer info to and from it via a jumpdrive or cd's...or you could just get an external usb harddrive and connect it to the pc whenever you're in the car.

Or you could go this route and get a HU that has a USB port and connect a jumpdrive or usb harddrive to it...
http://cgi.ebay.com/CAR-Stereo-CD-MP3-WMA-USB-PLAYER-Head-Unit-NEW-for-2006_W0QQitemZ7629344905QQihZ017QQcategoryZ18798QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

-Derek

[tekdeus]

Update! Just found some good manufacturers that offer the USB capability! I'm gonna do this for sure. Goodbye CD's! http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/2006-01-04-ces-stereo-thumb-drives_x.htm