Anyone out there installed a PC in their Honda/Acura??
I have been thinking about it for a couple weeks now. Since I dont have a cd player anymore, my thoughts are to build a 500-800Mhz PC with a small 7" LCD panel and an IR Remote Control mouse.. with a 120gig drive I could load my entire music collection into it.
Not to mention, emulators, DVD's and wireless web... (not while im driving)
Anyhow, I know im not alone...
Thoughts, comments, links???



[Modified by SEVENSIX, 11:23 PM 7/17/2002]

 

I'm sure you can do that, if you read maximum pc, some guy acutally did it in his car. He jacked the whole PC into the passenger side under the dash. That was HOT!

 

One of the things I plan on doing in the end w/ my car is installing a computer and wire it up to everything. I'm going to leave it to the computer to control the AC and radio entirely so I can put a touch screen in place of those 2 din slots. lights windows and doors also. I'm going to have it record any important information from the guages to disk just for kicks, such as speed, temp, etc etc. then to top it all off I'm going to add voice command and speach synthesys to it. that's my general idea at least.

writing the software is surprisingly easy, particularly the voice stuff, it's designing the hard interface that's dificult

 

Nice!!!

The options are endless!!!
Recording all driving data is very cool!
It just seems natural to add a pc to the car these days.
Im not sure why more people haven't done this already.
The biggest hurdle will be the LCD panel to VGA conversion. I have a couple links for places that sell parts, but it ends up being too expensive. I know that this can be done at a relativley low price... Im thinking under $500...
Im thinking about a touch screen as well, not sure how small I can find them. It would be very nice to not need a mouse to control...

 

Yep, the idea's a pretty scene. Don't forget the neon tubes in the pc compartment...
But need to consider for shock protection, and have as many anti-theft devices as possible!!

 

ya, just imagine a permanent connection with your Hondata . . .

And I'm sorry but those neon computer cases just make me sick, your Mobo isn't that cool looking

 

kenwood makes a 6.5 in touch screen moniter for single din......only problem is that it is 2800 dollars. it plays dvd/cd/cd-r....blah blah blah


http://www.kenwoodusa.com/product/pr...productId=2375

 

sounds like a laptop might be in the works? tho the largest 2.5" HDD without breaking the bank is about 30GB., u can easily fit everything under the passenger seat or something..it might also be somewhat easier to get an LCD screen in your dash to hook up to a laptop cuz it already has digital outputs for the stock LCD panel. might be cheaper than some custom VGA to digital converter...

 

ya but I would think that the interface built into the laptop would be very proprietary, and not really an easy plug'n play w/ another screen. however if you could get a VGA LCD pannel you'ld be great

Another reason for the laptop would be the built in power saving features, it would be alot easier on your battery than a custom built desktop system. it would also be easier to get the car power adaptor for that laptop rather than setting up a custom powersupply to run the machine off of 12V DC.

30 gig would be fine for my installation at least, I cant immagine caryying around more than 20 gig of MP3s at once, and if I want to swap them out, that's what wireless networking is for, just dump them down next time the car is in the garage

Hmm, I'll have to do some more work designing my system, you guys are inspiring me

 

yeah, it's true that connecting the LCD panel up will be a bit of a challenge if u don't have enuf info on them. i'm sure whatever screen u get for your car, it should be relatively easy to find the wiring for the connector on that.

for the laptop, the gfx components they use are pretty standard as well. however, as you mentioned, the connector will most likely be proprietary. tho the physical connector is standard (very small form factor), how the manufacturer has hooked it up will vary and that's some of the key info u would need. last thing would be figuring out a way to connect the wires correctly from that SFF connector to your chosen screen won't be as bad. all in all, should give u a cleaner signal than going from VGA then back to digital.