i've been looking into getting me a cd player for my car, and then i also remembered seeing some people put PCs into their cars to listen to mp3s, audio cds, etc. but i can't figure out how it would be worth it. sure, you can store tons of songs and stuff, but i've found a bunch of negative things: 1) heat-where i live, my car gets pretty hot after it's been sitting there for a while. that can't be good for pc parts! 2) boot-up time-it only takes a minute or so (or less) to boot up a computer, but with a cd player, you get instantaneous.... errr... music access? (you get the point) 3) shutting down-similar to the boot-up prob, but what if you accidently turn off the car before shutting down? that might corrupt files on the hard drive, etc. 4) controlling/playing music-it seems to me that just about any way of changing songs might become a little difficult, especially while trying to drive. but of course i've seen a lot of people do it, so it's got to be worth it, right? i'd really like to possibly try this, especially since i got a "decent" computer lying around (it would work for just playing mp3s, etc.), plus it would be so cool to say that i've got a computer in my car!
heat: Car amps also get pretty hot, but if the cabin area of your car is kept comfortable, I think you'll be OK. You could also look into some older stuff that might be able to be passively coolde with a newer, larger heatsing (just make sure it is on there very securly). You could also get fancy had have some sort of venting to the outside when the temp is low enough for it Boot time: No way around this. But with a few BIOS tweaks, a fast HD, and a simple OS install like a minimal Linux or Windows install, the system can boot pretty quick. shutting down: I had seen a clever solution where the guy rigged a circuit that looked for power on the alternator line. When the power cut off, it used the car's battery, but used a piece of APC software to shut the system down automatically. Controlling: Should I ever get around to doing this sort of thing myself, I was thinking of using somthing like a gravis gamepad, or maybe even a custom solution, and using a winamp joystich control plugin. If more sohisticated use is needed, it is best to either let a passenger do it, or stop and do it yourself.
or..... you could use a nice Xbox controller S (they are really good and connect to the USB port with a simple cable mod)
I was talking about this kind of thing with pesnki last night on MSN. I want to buy an MP3 "keg" for the AR Spider that I'm getting, but I don't want another Kenwood Head unit, but no one else seems to have a decent "keg" like storage solution. I was sayin to penski, that if someone like Kenwood came up with a unit that plugged into the CD changer port of the stereo and had a USB plug on the other end to control the PC that would be awsome, but until there is more of a market for MP3PC it looks doubtful.
Most people use the EPIA boards from Via for Car PCs. These have Via C3 processors, which generate a very minimal amount of heat and just about any computer part can withstand car temperatures even on a hot day. I mean it will not get over 50°C right? The bootup problem could be fixed by using DOS programs for MP3 playback or setting the computer into hibernate mode when shutting down. Both ways the start up times would be minimal. Shutdown would indeed be a problem, however you could hook the PC up to one of those batteries, which prevent your PC from going off in power failure. Or you could use a laptop as the PC and then it would run off of its battery, when power is lost. Another way would be hooking up the computer directly to the car battery (through an inverter to produce 230V): when the car is turned off, power is still supplied, in fact some cars don't cut of the electricity to the 12V outlets when turned off. One could even use a Pocket PC/Win CE device, which would have 0 shutdown/startup time, would be very power efficient, would have its own batterys and would even feature a touchscreen for controling the software. Only problem being that there probably isn't very good software for these platforms for these purposes, in addition to this you would have to find a way to hook up an external HDD, CD drive and monitor, which indeed could pose problems
ok combo of solutions: 1)Where do you live? Just how hot can the car get? Like Der Me!$ter said, unless your car gets REALLY hot, the'll work fine. 2)Use a Mini-ITX board like Der Me!$ter said, and get This powersupply. This allows you to NOT USE A NORMAL PSU, which means you dont have to go from the cars 12v to 220/120v back to 12v for the pc. You can tap right into the power on the car, and your set. 3)Starup: My 2nd system (athlon 766mhz, 192 ram, XP pro) boots in 33.4 sec, thats from power to login screen (in hibranate... i neve turn it off...), so that shouldn't be that much of an issue. 4)Shutdown: You can wire up a simple relay like the Power Down Protector from PCMods.com This will allow you to use the 12v always on line for the power, and then have it sense the 12v switched in the car, and trigger the computer to go into hibernate (only takes 10 or so sec.). You could wire it to the power switch, and set up windows to make the power switch go into hibernate and NOT shutdown.. Theres my $.02 Sorry about the long post Edit: if none of that makes sence, jsut ask... I just finished one of my finals (6 left ), and its still early
With regard to boot up times, I heard someone got their Linux car pc to boot in 19 seconds (pretty quick really)... This is balanced by the fact that it takes time to change CDs I guess..
ya, i guess it wouldn't get tooo terribly hot for the pc. one of the reasons i want to do this is because all i've got in my car is a radio, no cd, no tape, just radio of course this sucks, but i don't have enough money for a GOOD cd player. but i do have an old intel mmx pc that i think i could use for this. i'm hoping to spend next to no money at first (since i don't have a job ATM) but i'll upgraded things later. does the pc i've got sound like it would work? i would think so: intel mmx processor on a full size atx mobo with 4 pci slots and 3 other black slots (can't remember what they're called). mobo has onboard everything save for sound, which ok since i've got a spare sound card too. i've also got a 4 gb hard drive to use. it's also got around 160mb of ram that's all from memory, so some of it may not be right. but does it sound like it would work? the thing that i like about it is that the processor is passively cooled, so that makes things kinda easy. things i'd like to eventually add: 1)lcd screen where my current radio is for winamp visualizations, etc, along with maybe GPS features 2)some easy way to control it-keypad, etc. 3)gps abilities 4)other poo *kinda long, but oh well - the forums are back up and that's all that matters! * *edit* what about the hard drive? would bumps in the road, etc. mess it up at all? *edit edit * is it just me or do those compact psu not have any cables, even for things like a hard drive or cd-rom?
I think there is a extra plug, just not sure where it is... It sez that you can plug up a cd and hdd.... ANd wont that computer be REALLY BIG.... get something smaller, for under the seat or somthing...
for faster booting, couldnt you run embedded linux off a CF card on the ide line? the pocket pc solution is also a very good one, everything already there, and you can take it with you to stop it getting nicked Someone just needs to make an adapter that allows full sized disks to be used with pocket pc. My car at the moment has a mini mp3 cd player running off one of those tape adapters
I have computers in all three of my cars. if you mount it in the trunk it stays nice and cool, your trunk is pretty ambiently cool no matter how hot it gets outside. if you use a Via Eden board, you won't even lose space. boot up time does suck a little, but if you keep the stuff installed to a minimum, it only takes my boards about a minute and a half to boot up, which is fine by me. all I have to do to turn off my comps is touch the power button, XP shuts everything off immediatly and then shuts down the comp, takes less than fifteen seconds. you can turn the car off and leave the comp running for about an hour before it starts to put a drain on the battery, so accidently shutting it down is no hassle at all. playing music is simple, I have it set so I tap a button on my keyboard and winamp automatically starts up and plays a random song from my playlists, then it's set on shuffle so it just randomly plays songs untill I'm done. my remote controll lets me cycle through playlists with the touch of a button so if I want to hear a particular CD, or song, it only takes the touch of a button. better yet, you can set up video playlists as well and watch all your favorite videos while listening to the songs. personally, if you have the money and the knowledge, it's kind of silly to not put a comp in your car.
Do you have a full sized keyboard and a remote up front? Or do you have a "number pad" keyboard or what? Got any pics? THis sounds like a great setup! Sorry, thread hijack!
Use DOS. I installed a stripped down Win98 load on the machine I'm playing with, and set bootgui=0 in the config.sys file. Boots and is playing in roughly 14 seconds. AND, sitce it's DOS you can just power it off with no problems. For dos players, look for mpxplay or damp.
I've got hardware to do myself a car peecee, just as soon as I get some time, I'll be installing it, and the article/photos should follow soon thereafter. I'm using 1999 hardware, just wait till you see what I got hold of.
yes, it is kinda big, but like i said, i don't have toooo much money and i've already got that. plus, i was planning on putting it in my trunk anyways (and i hardly use that anyways) so i won't be losing valuable space or anything. linear, i'll be looking for your article, but i might go ahead and start messing around with my own SugarBear, i might have some more questions for ya once i get into this project
A quick not to anyone considering a MP3PC, Use a Laptop drive! They last much longer than 3.5" drives because they're designed for "rougher" handling as it were.
that's what i was gonna ask about next, phat. what about the cd drive? i mean if i have the actual pc in the trunk of my car, i don't think they make ide cables that long! maybe a usb drive or something?
USB sounds like the better idea.. Long IDE cable's dont work that well, so I'm led to believe. Not sure what the range on USB is though....?
well, i know that have at least 20 foot long usb cables, and that MIGHT reach. anyone else know for sure how long of a usb cable i could have? (might use some extra CAT5 cable or something). SugarBear, how'd you do your drives? and what about your power supply? did you use a normal one or one of those small ones that Green Soda linked to?
