In car PC - Build Thread

[DonaldG]

@ Carsey: Fantastic! Well done.

When are you going to do the complete write up for an article then?

[jaggerwild]

I was thinking of a setup I did where we relocated the head unit face away from the chase, we used a long wire harness put the chase under the drivers seat. Then ran the face of it to the drivers side visor, and used fiber glass to mold it into place. Then we replaced the factory head unit in the dashboard, witch was the reason for the whole install to make it less attractive to thieves.

[sinclair_tm]

Yes, a write up is needed. Plus what OS and other software are you running?

[carsey]

If I find time ill try do a write up, but not sure what to include in it

Its running Windows XP and also Centrafuse as the 'Front End' software to allow me to control things.

I bought a USB radio, but I need to solder some coax onto the aerial to allow me to connect it to the existing aeriel wiring loom.

[bruceb_uk]

Chris, I realise now that my request in the "Hard Drive wanted" thread you originally posted is way out of date (hope it doesn't break any rules.........oops).

I will wait and see if you get a chance to do the writeup you mention and go from there.

If I was starting this project (knowing as little as I do), I'd like to see the following....just in case you were looking for a contents list for th write up :-)

How to decide which m/board to use - what choices are there, and pros/cons.
How much technical know-how is involved - are we talking "buy a printed circuit board and solder component x here, y there"? Ie how much can you do with bought components?
Wiring diagram (?) and order of assembly
Particular quirks of the installation - 12v DC going into the mother board, for example - does/how does the psu regulate that?
Integrating the gps receiver....don't really get how that can be done, so a brief section on how that is done might be useful to people.

Sorry if these are dim questions - I'm really impressed with the unit and I think every Golf should have one....including mine!

[lcurle]

Your steering wheel is on the wrong side....might want to get an adapter kit :P
I have ongoing pictures on my website of my build for our demo truck....19 monitor woot woot!!!

[carsey]

Originally Posted by bruceb_uk

Chris, I realise now that my request in the "Hard Drive wanted" thread you originally posted is way out of date (hope it doesn't break any rules.........oops).

Dont worry, I have replied to that thread.

I will wait and see if you get a chance to do the writeup you mention and go from there.

Thats in progress.

If I was starting this project (knowing as little as I do), I'd like to see the following....just in case you were looking for a contents list for th write up :-)

How to decide which m/board to use - what choices are there, and pros/cons.
How much technical know-how is involved - are we talking "buy a printed circuit board and solder component x here, y there"? Ie how much can you do with bought components?
Wiring diagram (?) and order of assembly
Particular quirks of the installation - 12v DC going into the mother board, for example - does/how does the psu regulate that?
Integrating the gps receiver....don't really get how that can be done, so a brief section on how that is done might be useful to people.

Ill include that in the article Thanks for the ideas.

Sorry if these are dim questions - I'm really impressed with the unit and I think every Golf should have one....including mine!

Lets see some pictures of your golf

[carsey]

In CarPC Contents list.

*What is a in-car PC?
*What can be done on a in-car PC?
*Deciding what hardware to use
*Setting it all up
*Additional hardware that can be added (covered mostly in other sections)

Theres bound to be more, so would appreciate ideas or if you have any questions.

What is a in-car PC?
A in-car PC is basically very much similar to what you use in your house or office except it is built into a car or vehicle in the form of OEM looking.

What can be done on a in-car PC?
There are many different things taht can be done on an in-car PC. Some of the things that can be done is listening to a wide variety of music without the need to change CDs. Another ideal thing a in-car PC can be used for is satellite navigation. With the use of a GPS receiver and the right software, you in-car PC can be used to help you get from A to B as quickly as possible without the need to buy a seperate navigation unit.
In-car PC's can also be used for checking e-mails, listening to the radio, Bluetooth Phone support, iPod support, Web Browsing, Viewing what the weather is going to do and much much more. Please note that some of the features may require additional hardware such as the navigation, bluetooth phone support, radio and web support.

Deciding what hardware to use
When deciding what hardware to use it is ideal to note the power consumption of the hardware you are going to use. Ideally, you want it to be as low as possible as our cars dont have in infinite supply of energy when the engine isnt running as we are limited by the capacities of our batteries.

It is also very important to consider the size on the components that are going to be used and also carefully plan where the hardware of the PC will be mounted. There arent that many idea places where we can effectively 'hide' the hardware of the car PC. I found the cubby hole in the left hand side of the boot in my VW Golf to be ideal as it allowed me to hide the internal workings of the PC without using valuable space in my boot.

Another important factor to consider is the use of hard-drives. A hard-drive works by an internal platter moving across the surface of a disc to read/write data for storage. It isnt the best situation for the hard-drive to be subjected to a large amount of bouncing or rattles, which is why many people decide to use Solid State Hard-drives or USB memory for the purposes of storage. Personally, I have chosen an 3.5" sata Laptop Hard-drive and has never let me down yet. Should it break, there is the warrenty to cover any failures.

Motherboards; Ideally we want these to be as small as possible as for the reasons stated above. We can buy mini-itx motherboards which measure in the region of 17CM Square which makes it a lot easier to install into the car we are working on.

The screen is the focus point of our in-car PC system. We need this to be touch screen as using a mouse in the car would prove a very tricky task. Most people opt for a 7 or 8" touchscreen as they can be easily mounted into the dash or the location you want to install.

There are a wide range of GPS receivers on the market which range in price ranges. Ideally, we want them to be in the form of USB as this makes it ideal for quick and easy installation for the computer system we will be using.

The power supply. There are special power supplies that are made on the market which feature a shutdown timer, which basically detects when the ignition is turned on and then give the PC the go ahead to boot or shutdown. There is no need for any 240V adapters as a PC only ever needs 12V to run. Since our cars use 12V power, we can run a cable directly to the power supply.
Other peripihals such as radio and bluetooth devices, should they be needed, can also be purchased in USB form.

The overall specification of the hardware does not need to be great either. most certainly not the specification of our home PCs. This is because when our car PC is installed and running, we will most likely be running a 'Front-end' which basically allows you to control most aspects of what you need to do. The system I run is a 1.6GHz Intel Atom board and 1GB of RAM. I find this setup to be ideal and any programs I choose to run, and boot time to load quickly as this is because we arent clogging our operating system up with program etc.

Setting it all up
This is the tricky bit. Once you have decided on the specification of the hardware you need to think about where you are going to mount it all in the car. Actually, it would be wise to think about the location to where its all going to go, before you decide to undertake the task of installing a car PC.
The setup is very much the same as a home PC in terms of hardware and connections. You will most likely need longer wires, such as VGA for the monitor connection and USB, for the chance to run a USB hub in the front of the car and the use of the touchscreen in the monitor.

We also need to consider how we are going to get our audio to work since a PC will not be suitable to power the speakers in the doors. For this we need a headunit to amplify the weak signal produced by the PC into enough to give a good signal to our door speakers. Most aftermarket headunits offer a RCA input which allows us to use a stereo to RCA wire to get the signal from the PC to the headunit.

Probly the most complicated part of the build will be the installation of the screen upfront in the car. This will most likely require modification to parts to get the screen to securely fit. You may also have to re-locate the radio elsewhere if the screen is going to take up a lot of the space on the dash. With my installation, I had to locate the headunit into the glovebox as there wouldnt have been enough space with the installation of the screen.

The easiest way of getting power to our computer system would be to take a wire off the battery under the bonnet. Or alternatively, if you have a amplier and sub in the boot, take the power from one of there connections.
We also need to take a wire which is switched live on the vehicle in question. Switched live basically means that when the keys are in the ignition and turned once or twice, the cable has power. This is what we need to use to tell the PC to turn on. There is a connection on the power supply which allows us to connect a switched live cable to it.

Most commonly, we will need to use 5M cables to reach to front of the car. The cables we will most likely need are Power, Switched live(if it cannot be taken from the location of the PC install), Audio and USB. There may be other cables you need depending on your particular setup.




Hmm, thats all I can think of at the minute, but im sure question will soon prompt me to add extra things into the write up.

[jaggerwild]

Nice walk through man! Love that set up as well!
Cheers!

[wrench97]

Hey the steering wheel is on the wrong side!!!

Do you have any concerns over moisture from humidly changes?

[lcurle]

you could just put a single-ply membrane over the entire install and heat wrap the sides to "weather proof" it.

[carsey]

Not really any humidity happens in the car. There is never any moisture or anything.

PC runs happily at 33oC which I think is a really good temperature since its locked up in a relatively small cubby hole.


If anyone has any other questions....just ask.

[Jtsou]

My only scare is airflow, i think it will run a bit hot, especially since you live in england and will probably be using the heater a lot. We will see :D.

Nice work, though.

[carsey]

CPU runs at 33c and the HDD runs at around 23/24C

So it isnt really that bad.

[Jtsou]

No thats not bad at all!