CarPuter: Computer in my car

[Sync]

sounds very ambitious, but highly do-able.

suggestions/comments:

 

At last, someone who didn't think that it's impossible Great ideas you have, indeed.

 

1. why the crystalfontz, just jump straight into a small LCD since u are planning on to make the thing GPS capable. use that hole to house your wireless keyboard and mouse better

 

Starting small leh. Small LCD monitor will cost a bomb for me. The immediate application is ICE/Tuner replacement. 20x2 LCD will suffice for now. It'll also get me started with programming. If I have the LCD monitor first, I'd be too lazy to start IMO

 

2. for power, u may want to consider putting a UPS in the trunk, but the heat may kill the batteries in it. another thing to be concerned about a UPS is that i draws quite a high currnet to keep it batteries charged. however, they are a(very good stable power source.

 

Are small types available? Something that takes in from 9v to 18v, and keeps the charges, much like how a notebook battery would work. It would definately work like the ITPS voltage regulator, except that it stores power as well.

 

There is some carputer users tha| actually uses a seperate car battery wired up as a backup battery for the car as well as powering the 'puter. That's way over my skill level :P

 

3. u can still use a magnetic HDD, they can withstand quite a bit of shock even while they are spinning. to counter the slow boot up problem, y dont u wire a switch to your doors unlocking. in that way, when u dis-arm and unlock your doors the pc can start to boot up.

 

Heh, using Linux, so bootup will take up 1 minute the most (if I don't load anything much). Then again I may use XP, but XP does not work without a monitor, unless you use a dumb monitor driver, and from there I would have no idea how to control from lcd... hmph! If I use XP I will need HDD, I'll stick to flash for now.

 

Will the computer survive the cranking up if I get it to switch on before I start the engine? I think this will only work if I use a UPS.

[Saaber]

He is driving a Waja so I think he can get it easily from Malaysia....

[Firefox]

seem u r well prepared, all the best! keep us posted n show us photo when u r done.

[Sync]

I've done the research needed, studied all the possibilities, and came to a self satisfied conclusion... Now all I need is time and money.. It may be quite a while before I'm done because it's a hobby thing. I'll post as soon as I get something presentable.

[Madwolf]

Have you consider using a laptop ?

Easy to have direct 12V supply to charge laptop battery

Solve all DC-DC problem

 

Small in size.

Power saving as well, easily detachable

[Kapo]

Have you seen this : http://www.geocities.com/sableorient/auterra.html

 

Somebody's selling a data-logging software.

[RadX]

http://www.geocities.com/sableorient/auterra.html

[Emkay]

[reply]

I am planning to slowly replace my stock ICE with a 1Ghz computer as my entertainment system. Before proceeding to tell you what I plan to do, I need .....

So the only way to go is to do things slowly, until I can have the ultimate carputer, which will probably take me about two or three years. But the advantage is to be able to see it grow, as minor upgrades can make a person happier .

---

It has been almost 2 years now .. any picture or experience to share?

[Sync]

Nope, have not done anything, due to depressing gas prices, extreme drop in car prices, 5% GST, etc...

 

What I've done though is to change the ICE with a headunit that accepts line-in so that I can use my iPod's line-out. A lot better than the way I used to listen to the ipod, that is using a radio transmitter.

 

That's all, nothing exciting.

[Fortress]

There was a news saying that Microsoft is investing in car computing, telematic and ECU...my greatest fear, which I believe is experienced by many, is to "re-boot" your car when driving. Already, expereincing this problem with mobile phones.

[Emkay]

HAhaha

 

In the not so far future, the main cause of road accident will be Blue Screen of Death!

 

I know your fear, I am still stick to my Treo600

[Fortress]

 

 

Ever tried rebooting on the track on a formula Holden at 230 kmh, it is scary, you were be hoping that the system will start before you need to brake for the corner.

[Emkay]

there is this shop in sim lim square that have some mini-itx form factor PC (i think) .. the price for a barebone is quite close to normal PC already .. together with a touchscreen (with USB touchscreen) .. may be it is among the cloest we can get our hand on a carputer from singapore.

 

as of now, the biggest obstacles includes:

 

1. Good & userfriendly GPS (contineously updated) maps and routing software. The folks in MalSingMaps has done quite a good job on this ..

 

2. TP .. u know what i mean .. need to have some way to conceal the screens so it's not too obvious when one of them ride pass your car.

 

3. Heat & vibration problems in singapore/malaysia .. solid-state-diskdrive (2.5" & 3.5") can solve the problems but they are still not easily available in singapore.

 

4. Software. I still don't fancy a $200 MS Xp as a carputer OS .. a customisable Linux will be best. Anyone here into customising linux os? think of the possibility .. run a USB hub and u can have USB cam (cheap!) to monitor front and back (for reversing) as well as charging ur phones, etc. Have wi-fi and u can surf through hotspots around the islands.Not to mention the standard MP3/MP4/DivX/Xvid/WMA playback but also the classic 1945 game for the passengers?

 

5. non-standardisation of ECU signals and connectors .. which means, whatever u created to read stuffs like mileages/consumption/speed/temperatures etc will not be portable to another car (or your next car).

[Emkay]

having said that's let's be fair to M$ as well .. the stability of their OS has improve drastically compared to win95 era... but it is still quite an issue for the long start up and sometime difficulty in shutting down..

 

immagine:

 

1. You reach your home after a long day at work, drive to your carpark and try to switch the car ignition off.. but the engine just won't kill .. dashboard show .. "one of your piston has stopped responding, kill it now?" this will leave most car drivers on the road panic. Or worse case, no message at all .. dashboard just show "Shuting down... please wait". All you can do, is to pop the bonet, disconnect the battery and wait for 3 minutes before connect them back.

 

2. The next day, your're 5 minutes later then your usual leave-home time, cos u spent 3 hours reading the 800 pages user manual and surf the online knowledge base but can't find a solution to problems you faced last evening. You put the key into ignition, turned it and expect engine to start in the usual 3 minutes .. a new fanciful pop-up message appears on your dash .. "We noticed that you did not shutdown your car properly previously" (now it's your fault !) "Checking Engine block integrity. This may take sometime.... 1%" ...

 

3. You arrived in office 1 hour late. After kenna scolded by your boss for 30 minutes, you start-up your computer and check your email .. You received an email from .. wait a minute .. from your car??? your car is sending an email asking if you want to buy 'real' viagra at a special price! damn ..check the sending date/time, it was just 50 minutes ago!! "I was still driving the car .. how did it happen?" and you suddenly realised your car has kenna a trojan/virus that connect your phone through bluetooth and initiated a 20minutes long GPRS session to spam some 1000 email and the authorities is after you now...

[Kanr]

Cool bro,!!!!

[Fortress]

Good one..

[Gabriel]

I am planning to slowly replace my stock ICE with a 1Ghz computer as my entertainment system. Before proceeding to tell you what I plan to do, I need to know if there is anyone(s) here who is familiar or have expertise in:

• Car electronics

• Simple electrical/electronics experience or skill

• Ripping out car's interior to do wiring

• Create custom case/shell/fascia/mounts with stuff like clay, resin, plastic, etc.

This is because I really don't have the skill to do any of the above, although I'd be doing the computer myself, it'll probably be a mess of cables on the glove compartment + an LCD mounted with putty on the dash . A shop that can do all of the above mod jobs at a reasonable price would be cool too.

 

Why Computer?

Nowadays, at most homes, computers can replace the TV, CD Player, DVD Player and many other functions as well. For cars, if you need those functions, you'd install an ICE that will need you to fork out tons of cash upfront. In my case, after buying a car, I can't fork out anymore cash upfront as I'm now a lot poorer. So the only way to go is to do things slowly, until I can have the ultimate carputer, which will probably take me about two or three years. But the advantage is to be able to see it grow, as minor upgrades can make a person happier .

 

The Plan

Since I'm going to have to start somewhere, my first investment would be the LCD display and the input devices. I'll be getting the Crystal Fontz black/red 20x2 LCD display, which should be enough for my displaying needs. I will need to write a program for it so that it can do simple things like song selections, volume adjustment, and radio tuning. There are other uses as well, like get readouts from the car, you know, RPM, speed, distance travelled, or even more exotic stuff like your fuel/air mixer readings, even failure codes, this is of course, provided that I can find that damn OBD II connector in my Waja (have not been able to open up the lower part of the dash).

 

For inputting data to the computer, there's four buttons from the LCD, I'll have to find a way to reuse the Waja's four buttons (need electronics people here) on the steering wheels too, and for the extreme coolness factor, I'll get this blue glowing programmable jogdial . There's also the possibility of voice recognition as input, and voice as output, for example, telling you what song the computer is going to play before playing

it, tell you the temperature, or just a random joke of the day.

 

All this programming will take me a while, and I'll do it on my notebook first. Once I get something working, and I can grab songs from the iPod, I'll then proceed to buy the next big thing. Which is:

• Mount the LCD to the dashboard nicely with custom made mount

• Get ITPS-Auto Power Sequencer and Dropout Regulator

• Get the DC-DC 12v power supply

• And the most important part, the computer itself.

• Computer radio tuner

Optional items:

• Wireless LAN (so I don't have to connect the damn network cable when I have to do some changes on the computer with my notebook)

• An AMP with SPDIF optical input

• Relay controller so that you can control stuff like your power windows

Here's where I'll hit a snag. The power source will have to be from the car battery, and someone will have to get dirty with installing it. And I have no idea how to do the cabling and installation nicely.

 

The ITPS will have to be connected to the ignition and battery, and cables will go to the computer which will probably be located under the seat (need people who can do this) or at the boot. And the computer will also have cables connected to the dash for the LCD.

 

The computer will boot up linux, so as to ensure fast boot up times, as well as to guarantee stability, you don't want to have Windows crashing on your car, do you? It will have no hard disk, just Compactflash, all the mp3 songs will come from the iPod, which also acts as a storage device for data.

 

What can this grow to?

Ok, ultimately, since this is done at own time own target, the computer will be able to do a few things (and more) like.

• Replacement for ICE, CD, mp3, CD ripper (limitless possibilities)

• Gather statistic about your car

• See how you drive on a particular day, show graphs of usage

• Produce excel charts for analysis of your driving habits

• Mileage calculations

• Financial details - like how much money have you spent on your car

• Car servicing, oil replacement, atf replacements alarms

• Tell you your car's trouble code

• Clear those engine warning light that normal mechanics can't switch off

• Most importantly, sync with my Palm

The Future?

Ok, if I suddenly have cash falling on me from a tree, or I've collected enough, I can then invest on an LCD monitor, either 5 to 7" and from there, you've suddenly got the ability to do other cool things, like:

• Browse the Internet

• Gossip at MCF

• Look up the weather reports

• Check out the causeway cameras real time

• Check out how your stocks perform

• GPS to know exactly the distance from where you are, to the toilet

• Get lost with GPS

• See VCDs or DVDs

• Write your email while driving

Do things that you would do with your computer. The possibilities are endless.

 

Tell me what you think?

[Bluemice]

bro use linux la... little worries once it works..haha

 

most thing abv can do, liao... best aprt. use a P2 450MHz proc can liao...fanlesss HSF...

+ solid state mem device... eg sony MS PD 2GB *2 shld be more than enuf. ever tried to boot to a ram disc b4... real fast... on a HTPC...

 

honestly speaking, the role of a car puter is not so significant now, maybe a CarPalm or CarPPC might be easier n probably... esp a GPS linked Palm or PPC can do wonders....

 

then with the BT enabled GSM phone, can read email or MCF liao...lol

 

MP3/MP4 the palm or PPC can do... viedo as well..

 

mice