New to the board, project questions!

**smeagol** · 03-03-2003, 07:01 PM

Glad I found you guys... very cool forum. Love seeing the projects others have done, and that I'm the lone geek wanting to put a pc in a car

Had some questions about a project I'm working on.

Background - daily driver is a Jeep Wrangler with an Empeg player - I love it, whole point for me was to avoid lugging around tons of CD's. I got it discounted for $200 a year or so ago, best purchase I've made for the jeep

(tho I may itch for a GPS later)

My other vehicle - my AWD turbocharged Syclone - is my race/weekend cruiser. Music isn't a huge priority in it, as I don't spend a whole hell of a lot of time in it. However i do spend a lot of time tweaking/tuning for performance with it, and 90% of the time I'm in it, I have a laptop with a scan tool running. So i thought.. why not have a pc running full time, no need to lug a laptop around, have wires all over, and i could have a dashboard in front of me, monitor ECM data full time when I'm driving. The software is out there for this already, choice of several different packages. Mp3's etc, will be a bonus

not a main focus

Needs of my system:
*200mhz or faster
*requires a keyboard (to enter filenames, basic file management, reviewing datalogs)
*runs windows (can't confirm *any* of the software runs under anything else yet)

These are pretty easily met, was planning on a via epia motherboard etc.

the needs/wants for a display are the most difficult
* somewhat affordable
* my scan tool dashboard display software is readable (I'm guessing this necessitates a VGA setup)
* the display can be removed/hidden so as to not attract thieves
* 640 x 480 resolution
* 8-12" ideally
* touch screen isn't necessary, as i'd still need a keyboard for data entry, and multimedia playback isn't the goal.

I was hoping someone could suggest some good displays. I've done TV output from a pc, and I have seen the loss of display quality; i'm pretty sure this wouldn't be acceptable for what i'm trying to do. I'd hate to spend money on displays that I've read good things about, only to find out that it wouldn't work well in my application.

TIA

**Charliey** · 03-03-2003, 08:19 PM

well, i would suggest either a 7" widescreen vga screen, but that might not really be big enough; or a 8-12" lcd that runs from a controller card. someone in the forsale forum is selling controller cards right now, and you can pick up lcds on ebay for not too much.

heres the thread in the forsale forum:
FS: LCD Controllers - $90.00+shipping

good luck, check out different posts here, theres a lot of info here already.

**frodobaggins** · 03-03-2003, 10:42 PM

I want my finger back.

**jstrain** · 03-04-2003, 10:42 AM

i don't really have anything helpful to add, but i do want to welcome another fellow empeg owner to the board. i have had mine for about 2 1/2 years now, and it is, hands down, the best purchase i have ever made for the car.

welcome to the board.