Carputer Project

[Brettster]

Looking pretty damn fine ther Mr Fargo :)

im very impressed :)

as for the Jap Satnav maybe the older ones used a smaller screen? im sure i read somewhere that the newer DVD based satnavs used a widescreen LCD?

[TheDon]

looking good there fargo, serverly impressed i am!!!!

Realy like the idea you got there as well. makes a lot of sense having the screen there rather than high up.

[Fargo]

thanks brett, ta chris.. yeh having it low down means its at finger tip reach. plus i already got the nav up top..

[necromax]

...means your not concentrating on the road when selecting MP3s though... ..

[Fargo]

same as when you press abutton on your stereo dear boy..lol..

[necromax]

...I would agree... a mate of mine has his lilli balanced by his gearshift.. he said its a little awkward when you're looking for a specific song... I pointed out thats what playlists are for :)

[Fargo]

plus i also got a job wheel/knob thingy.. tis very cool looking,, looks like the old school type volume knobs, big round silver brushed looking.

but withthe adition of a cool underbody blue LED..

that will be used for scrolling..

[necromax]

...sounds cool, I miss my steering remote, the Pioneer one never seemed to work very well. Is it a hardwired (usb?) jobby or infrared?.. Bluetooth ?

[Fargo]

AT LAST,, finally got the PC up and running..after the PSU blew on me earlier this week.

this pic shows the stereo and boot up screen.

this one shows the griffin powermate just below and to the left of the gear knob

all thast left to do is make a suitabel switch and LED status panel in the ash tray..

[necromax]

Looks fantastic... might be tempted by one of those powermates.. so what was wrong with your PSU ?

..those blue lights look nice, I wish I had some of those

[Fargo]

lol yeh i know you want the blue lights,,, patience young man,, guy in china is busy busy busy....i wouldnt want you to have a kit that was more expensive and obsolete when hte new kit come out

dunno what was up with the other PSU,, geoffers has kindly agreed to look at it..

[necromax]

ahhh... you replaced it. I thought you'd fixed it. That solution is always gauranteed to work :)

[Brettster]

Looking sweeeeeeeeet dude!!

was it your opus that blew up? or the psu for the monitor?

also do you have it set to go to sleep when you turn of the ignition?

thats how i have mine set up and ive left the car for about 4 days and its still started first time and the pc woke up in 2 seconds and kicked out some tunes :)

[Fargo]

ahhh... you replaced it. I thought you'd fixed it. That solution is always gauranteed to work :)

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im an impatient man sometimes,, was quicker to get a new one..

Looking sweeeeeeeeet dude!!

was it your opus that blew up? or the psu for the monitor?

also do you have it set to go to sleep when you turn of the ignition?

thats how i have mine set up and ive left the car for about 4 days and its still started first time and the pc woke up in 2 seconds and kicked out some tunes :)

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yeh was the opus,, but also found that the 'egg' power regulator for the screen had stopped working, so luckerly i had already run a lenght of 20 core cable (1.5mm wires) which i inteneded to use for the switches and status leds (from the mobo) and for future expansion, so i simply hooked up the screen to a regulated 12v feed fromthe mobo side of the ATX connectors.

aint decided what i want to do Re the hibernate,, i would prefer to have it all off when i leave the car.. simply cause i got so many cables and mods to various boards inthe dash that i dont want any power to be on...

[Brettster]

I run my screen from the opus too, but you have to make sure your using the latest touch screen drivers otherwise the pc does'nt go into sleep mode and the opus forces a shut down.

[Fargo]

ak ok,, i'll bear that in mind..

[necromax]

There is a product called 'ReadyOn' which some guys on MP3car.com were looking at. Basically works kind of like hibernate but more advanced, my understanding is that it saves a 'state' of your machine, and restarts to that exact state each time, fast!. This would obviously mean it would not return to the song/album or point you were at when you shut it down, so last I saw the guys were experimenting with ini files and keeping them and the mp3's on a seperate parition, so it would start up Frodoplayer for example, read the ini file off drive D and resume whatever you were last playing. It would also make the image smaller having the mp3s on a seperate partition, and allow it to start quicker.

It was about £25 to buy I think...

[Brettster]

yeah I read that too sounds good :)

but im really happy with the sleep mode, my carputer has been running and sleeping for around 6 months now without a rebbot needed. I really cannot believe how stable it is, and even more unbelievable is that its running windows xp without bsoding or anything!!!!!!!

[Fargo]

Brett,, canyou tell me what your hibernation set up is..

ie jumper on the opus and your bios setup..

seems on mine i cannot find a hibernate button/setting in XP, and on the bios there is no AICP ( i think) enables selection (as per the opus manual for settingup the epia mobo, step 1) only AICP S1 or S3 etc.

[Brettster]

Im using the 90 watt opus as it came from the factory, set winxp to go into sleep mode when the power button is pressed, when you turn off the key the psu tells the epia that the power button has been pressed and windows goes into windoze mode, when you turn the key again it springs back to life.

if you find the pc is not going into sleep mode and the opus is forcing it to shut down, check your drivers for the touch screen are upto date, or unplug the usb cable from the screen before you turn off the key, to check

[Fargo]

ta i'll have check..

[Mr Singh]

Looks like NASA control center in there

Good work!!

[Fargo]

Brett, what front end are you running, media engine, media car ??

[necromax]

Have you had a look at Frodoplayer? Seems to be very popular and constantly under development. From what I understand MediaEngine has gone very slow since it started using an access database to build its playlists etc...

[Fargo]

ive loaded mediacar and frodo ontop the laptop to have a butch and to be honest they look kinda crap, ie thrown together and rough looking..

mediaengine however (what im currently using) looks so much more Pro and easier to use, ie the buttons are a nice size.