Could use a little hardware help.

**thacarter546** · 10-01-2012, 10:29 PM

I have been doing alot of research. I have a general idea of what I want my set-up to look like and do. As for what its gonna do: I want it to play music primarily and do it well. I plan on replacing my hu with this. It will be feeding alot of audio and video equipment. I would also like to add gps, hd radio, and dvd functionality is a must. I would also like to play my emulators with it. Dolphin would be awesome but if it could play up to an n64 emulator I would be thrilled.

The equipment I have so far. I have 2 1gb sticks of ddr2 laptop ram sticks, a 2gb and 4 gb ddr3 laptop ram stick, a 320 gb 2.5" hard drive, a tk55 processor (can only find one socket s1 mini itx board) Oh yeah and two slim dvd drives.

Ive already ordered my touch screen. I went with a cheapy proximus 7 inch usb unit. As for getting into the bios I will be feeding video into my existing monitors in my vehicle.

I also have a LEGAL license for xp home and pro 32 bit so that is what I will be running (one of the two anyway)

Really what Im having trouble with Is deciding a power plant. I hate intel with a passion. I would prefer not to run intel. I would prefer to use the ram Ive got. I dont mind buying ddr3 ram but ddr2 is expensive!

The serious choices Im considering:

gigabyte GA-E350N Integrated E-350 processor. From my research its quite a bit faster than the comparable atom chips tests higher in pcmark. I know the old atom single core in my eeepc will run project 64 good nuff so this should too. I dont know how itll hold up with a usb monitor and a carpc front. 81 bux total

Zotax 880g-itx AM3 board with an athlon x2 5200+ I see no reason this couldnt do everything im asking for. At 65 watts it outs out alot more heat. Only supports direct x 9 where the other two options support 11. 102 bux total.

AMD a4-A6 with a mATX motherboard not sure which mobo yet. This puts me in at the highest budget at around 140ish. It also consumes alot of space.

The car its going into is a 92 caprice classic. Plenty of room but its almost all occupied by something or another. Power concerns are non existent. Im running dual 135 amp alternators (just until I have the time and funds to rebuild them with the ice 220 amp kits and over drive pulleys) and 4 gel cell oddysseys.

**thacarter546** · 10-03-2012, 01:10 AM

Well im ashamed to admit it, but I went with intel. I got too good of a deal to pass up. I went with an intel core 2 duo t5600 and a HP ASUS MOCA-AR. Paid 50 total well under my budget and fit the bill. Now hopefully I dont have all the problems Ive had in the past with intel.

I already know with this mobo Ill have to modify a socket a/370 heatsink to fit because it lacks the holes for a desktop heatsink.

**Wy2quiet** · 10-05-2012, 01:45 PM

That should be more than enough for what you are planning to do. For those of us with more power, we do so for the reasons of DSP.

For instance I did the same thing as you. I replaced my H/U SQ setup with a car PC and 8 output MAudio 1010LT.
I have the PC constantly running;
L crossovers
R crossovers
L parametric eq
R parametric eq
L delay
R delay

Anytime I am listening to music I am at 10-12% constant CPU usage on a G530 CPU. Power consumption was very important, and I believe I am around 30w under load and less at idle, since my amps run around 30-50a @ 12v under load.

**thacarter546** · 10-05-2012, 06:06 PM

Originally Posted by Wy2quiet

That should be more than enough for what you are planning to do. For those of us with more power, we do so for the reasons of DSP.

For instance I did the same thing as you. I replaced my H/U SQ setup with a car PC and 8 output MAudio 1010LT.
I have the PC constantly running;
L crossovers
R crossovers
L parametric eq
R parametric eq
L delay
R delay

Anytime I am listening to music I am at 10-12% constant CPU usage on a G530 CPU. Power consumption was very important, and I believe I am around 30w under load and less at idle, since my amps run around 30-50a @ 12v under load.

My first problem is the t5600 I ordered was not 100% compatible with the mobo so ditched that for a more powerful t7200.

How are you running your crossovers with the computer? I was planning on running an active crossover. Either my Clarion 785USB (built in 3 way crossover with adjustable slopes) or purchasing a trunk mount unit. I really favor the trunk mount unit because I want to mount the screen in the dash. Although I have a location for the 785 if I use it.

I figure either way Im looking at buying a good 7-8 volt line driver, Im using an unregulated sub amp that favors high voltage inputs. The speaker amps can do with 0.2-5 volts. As you can tell not really going for SQ here. Everything I build in here will need to be clipped down or secured. Kind of worried about the laptop ram unclipping.

As for power I have dual 135 amp alternators with OD pulleys, but full tilt (an often event in this car) the sub amp alone is drawing 225+ amps although with music its not a constant 225 amps.

I have a feeling Ill be switching to a ssd for the operating system and a good external with at least a good 32mb cache