ION overkill for CarPC?

**upspace** · 09-16-2009, 08:06 AM

found this interesting reading:

"...An average car battery has an amp-hour rating of about 50 Ah. But does this mean it can put out 50A for an hour, or that it can put out 1A for 50 hours? The interesting thing about batteries is that the faster you try to pull out the electrons, the less it can provide. If you had a battery rated at 50 Ah, you could put out far more than 50 hours if you drew only 1A. For instance, if you ran all your interior lights (together, they might add up to 1A) on a 50 Ah battery, you could easily go 50 hours (about 2 days) or more. A good battery might last as long as a week.

However, if you hooked up some item that drew 50A, it would be pulling 50A x 12V = 600W. This would be like powering 10 normal indoor light bulbs, and it would kill your battery in just a few hours or less.

To be more precise, battery vendors designate the number of hours over which their amp-hour ratings applyusually 20 hours. By specifying "50 Ah @ 20 hours," they are saying that you get 50 Ah if you drain the battery over 20 hours. That works out to about 2.5A per hour (50 Ah / 20 hours = 2.5A). In other words, if you draw 2.5A, you should get exactly 20 hours of life out of a fully charged 50-Ah battery. If you draw only 1A, you should get more than 20 hours, but it's hard to say how much moreperhaps 40+ hours. If you draw 5A, you will get less than 20 hours, and probably less than 10 hours because you're draining it above its specification.

So, if you know a battery has a specific Ah rating, just divide it by 20 to get the amperage at which you could run your devices for 20 hours. By keeping your device amperage under the value you get, you should be able to get your 20 hours or more of power.

When you get to the end of the 20 hours, the battery is not completely drained. However, it will have dropped below 11 volts, and it is for all intents and purposes "discharged," in the sense that the voltage is too low to start your car or power your device. The battery most likely also will be damaged and will have a shorter life span, as conventional car-starting batteries are not designed for deep discharge...".

assume i have a 58 ah @ 20 hours battery, i could draw approx. 3 a (58 / 20) for twenty hours before battery is discharged. or running my ion (3 a x 12 v = 36 watts) for 20 hours while putting fuel (should be enough even to have a coffe, go shopping).

i get one!

**bemenaker** · 09-16-2009, 09:11 AM

Upspace, I've left my carpc play for six hours and had no problems cranking my engine at the end. Never turned it off, just jumped in started and went.

**DarquePervert** · 09-16-2009, 10:21 AM

Originally Posted by afterdigital

what power supply runs your system?

DSATX, but I chose it more for the monitoring and configuration ability that no other DC-DC PSU had at that time.
My full system specs are in my profile, if you want to know all the details.

My setup is pretty lightweight compared to the specs of other members here.

Originally Posted by upspace

DO WE NEED A CAR PC

well i need a car pc because no other handheld device, mobile, itune, iphone, video player does mp3, flac, ogg, aac, wma, wmv, and all those avi, mks etc.

i used to have a couple of years back a pinnacle receiver for my living room. great device but could not play all medias, so i had to go pc/htpc.

i don'want to converrt all those nice music and vids just to be playable in the car which keeps me busy for years. though you need a pc (linux or windows os) which can handle all those formats/codecs.

My point is that you don't need to listen to anything at all in your ride.
Car audio is a creature comfort whether it's a stock headunit, a complete A/V system, a PC or an iPod.
Your vehicle will function 100% if there is no entertainment system installed whatsoever.

Don't get me wrong. I wholly understand and appreciate your reasons for WANTING a PC in your ride. But it is still a WANT, and not a NEED.

DO WE NEED AN IRON BOARD

i want to be ready for 3d mind blowing google earth like navigation software (if it is ever released for normal os). i used to have the little valley intel which was great but graphics sucked.

What does 3D nav software have to do with pressing your clothes?

BEING GREEN

not because i am into green politics but i like the idea of energy efficient technology. it safes you from a lot of hassles (heat, fans, noise etc.). especially in a car environment with 12v which was designed / specified at a time when you had manual :-) ignition

Ummmm. OK.

NOW THE PHYSICS

is it easy like that (even if only theoritical): battery of 60 ah (amperehours) means that i could draw (theoretically) 20 hours of 3 ampere to run the computer (or 1 hour of 60 ampere) till the battery is fully discharged. sorry occupied a windows seat at physics:-)

I don't know all the math & physics involved.
I do know that my setup with a STOCK battery would allow me to run my setup with the engine off for at least three hours. I've never tried to run it longer than that.
Frankly, the PC in my truck is there to use when I'm traveling, not when I'm sitting in a parking lot.

Originally Posted by upspace

assume i have a 58 ah @ 20 hours battery, i could draw approx. 3 a (58 / 20) for twenty hours before battery is discharged. or running my ion (3 a x 12 v = 36 watts) for 20 hours while putting fuel (should be enough even to have a coffe, go shopping).

i get one!

I'm gonna throw this little reality check out there....

If you're going to park your car and go shopping, you probably aren't going to leave the PC running during this time.
Most of us setup a SSDC to turn the PC off (or hibernate/standby) after 15-30m. That is plenty of time to fill up the gas tank and grab a Slurpee, so when you start the car, you have music playing already, since the PC never shut off.

For anything longer, the PC shuts off (or hibernates/enters standby) and when you turn the key, the PC boots back up.

**upspace** · 09-16-2009, 10:54 AM

thanks guys. i am comfortable with 40 watts now.

@DarquePervert: I can spend ours in a parking lot or similar - Neither darque nor pervert :-) wanting to have music

i will order one of those asrock ion 330 with dvd and let you know my experience

**Punky** · 09-16-2009, 03:23 PM

careful with the asrock, it uses 19V so you'll need the carnetix,
use the zotac if you want atx psu.

**DarquePervert** · 09-16-2009, 05:06 PM

Originally Posted by upspace

@DarquePervert: I can spend ours in a parking lot or similar - Neither darque nor pervert :-) wanting to have music

Whatever floats your boat, man.
I guess I'm different or maybe just older. I gave up hanging out in parking lots when I graduated high school.

To each his own.

**nisarg86** · 09-17-2009, 02:53 AM

I have been using ZOTAC Dual Core ION(D-E) since last month. and the performance of this baord is just awesome. i wouldn't say ION is overkill. I just went with Zotac coz of my boot issues with Intel Atom boards.

**SFiorito** · 09-17-2009, 10:28 PM

btw, i also got 800x480 working no problem on this board using nvidia's custom rez settings

**hailrazer** · 09-17-2009, 10:48 PM

Originally Posted by SFiorito

btw, i also got 800x480 working no problem on this board using nvidia's custom rez settings

What lcd ? And more details

**SFiorito** · 09-18-2009, 07:21 AM

one of the original lilliput/mp3car transflectives....i believe they are 629s, but with ccfls not leds.

all I had to do was go into the nvidia control panel, clicked add custom resolution and set 800x480x60hz. all other options I left as default.