Hey what up HT,


I am trying to round everything up I need to start tuning my car. One thing Im missing is a laptop. I was gonna consider driving with my desktop in the car and just tune with that, But with a 19" LCD screen, Its not looking like the best option. Anyways I was looking into laptop pricing and I came across this acer thing.

pros
(1) small as heck
(2) internet on the go
(3)XP is already on it.

cons
(1) no disk drive
(2) it cost like 310 to 320

I put a link on here so you can check it out and tell me what you think

http://cgi.ebay.com/Acer-Aspire-One-...3A1%7C294%3A50

 

What software are you tuning your car with?

 

A Aspire One or Asus EEEPC has too small screens (just 1024x600 pixels). On the most programs you will miss anything on the screen. I would prefer for tuning purposes a stadard laptop with nice big screen (1280x1024 pixels or more) to have enough overview over all tables, parameters, etc.

I also use a Aspire One, but use it mostly just for datalogging or change some small parameters (i.e. boost table) on the street, strip and track.

 

Ill be tuning my car with ECTune. and money is really tight to get a brand new Laptop. And when purchasing these use laptops of Ebay they forwarn you about them not checking the battery. Is battery life something I should worry about or do you guys normally tune with your laptop charging through the Cigerett lighter.

 

bump

 

Should try your local pawn shop I got a good deal on a dell laptop and for batteries best is buy an extra when tuning on the street in case one goes out

 

I use an Aspire One and as stated; the only complaints i would have is the screen size. I love the fact that its small and compact and light. No harddrive bothers me as it has 3 USB 2.0 Drives, and a micro SD card slot, and a Memory expansion port.

 

stay away from anything with a super small screen

 

i use a acer one/mini to tune with ectune

no complaints

 

I thought about getting one of those but decided it was too small.

About the battery, most laptops don't last long enough for a full tuning session so I always use a power inverter.

 

i got a 6cell with my acer

it last 5 hrs

 

this computer is something that shouldnt be used as a main comp, but more of a side unit. if it were to be used only for tuning, it may be alright, but the RAM is so low that it probably wont give you the speed you need. it is expandable, tho...but moneys involved in that.
also, a used one would be even slower.
this is definitely something youll have to consider heavily before investing. you may be better off investing in a new computer with a bigger screen

 

If you go with something newer, I would wait a little bit till the solid state drives become more prevalent in the computer packages at a reasonable price. Your tuning computer may/will take some abuse of in and out of vehicles and so forth, and having a drive that is designed for that is a key. I have fried more than a handful of HD's out of my tuning computers.

Also if this computer is going to be used for primarily a DB9 connection for data transfer, I would suggest finding an older IBM thinkpad. USB to Serial Converters work, but can be very buggy at times. Especially using LogWorks software from Innovate.

 

Thanks to all of you guys for everything. What Im gonna do is purchase a laptop and then post pictures and the specs of it to better show maybe a newbie the decision that I've made.

 

Buy a converter that plugs into your cigarett lighter, NEVER NEVER tune Off battery power, You dont want power outage when tuning your EMS/ECU.

 

i Have an aspire i have ectune,uberdata,turboedit,crome,and aem pro v1.0 and aem log works great

 

i also changed my OS its windows xp dark edition its really light on the system so its works great with out of the box hardware