Thread: In need of advice. Dump the carputer? Continue the project? Long read..

I have a long story about the history of my car computer project. I'm about to dump the whole project, and need some advice..

So since I was in higschool, and had my first car, and my first job, I've been working on an mp3 car project. It's been a hobby of mine.
It has been an off-and-on project/hobby of mine for almost 10 years now. My first car was a 76 Mustang, and I never made enough money to actually get anything installed in it. (the first computer consisted of a pentium 133, 128mb ram, WINAMP autoloaded at startup, no visual display, and used a numeric keypad to cycle songs ... basically what an ipod shuffle can do now ... very very sad LOL)

Then in 04, I bought my second car. A brand new 04 Chevy Cavalier. A few jobs later, I land a job at an electronics retailer, and get HUGE accomodations off car audio stuff. I ended up getting Infiniti kappa's all the way around, a 4-channel infinity amp, a Pioneer headunit, and an Eclipse Subwoofer & Amp, box, capacitor, RCA's, etc. I have a full blown car audio system that peeks out at about 1000watts -- but the carpc project was collecting dust in a closet...

I finish buying & gathering all the parts of my carputer over time, and have everything completed. I was able to wire everything up temporarily in my car as a test, and it worked! I was never able to get everything permanently mounted, because I abosuletly SUCK at fabricating stuff.

It consists of a pentium 4, 2.0ghz, 512mb ram, 1gig highspeed CF card + IDE adapter, GPS, WiFi, etc, all the goodies! To control the computer I had planned on using an IR remote, and a tiny playstation keyboard.

For my display, I was going to use a few sony psone lcd's. I hacked one to VGA to use as the "main display", and was going to wire up a back-up camera with a switch to toggle between the cam and the PC display. The other screens would all display the computer. I wanted to put them everywhere, dash, visors, headrests, etc. lol..

So an AWESOME deal comes my way, and I trade the cavalier in for a truck. 2006 Chevy Colorado extended cab z71. I never saw myself driving a truck, lol.

So, needless to say, I have a LOT less space to work with now, no trunk, etc. Now I have to come up with a way to put my sub in the extended cab. I can fit the amp under the back seat. I have no idea what to do with the 4-channel amp, since it's so long. and then my car pc MIGHT fit under a back seat, i'm just worried it's going to be too tall..

and if I DO end up putting my car pc in the truck, using a keyboard or remote is a terrible way to control the computer. I'd REALLY want a touchscreen. If I do keep the carpc, I'd probably end up getting a motorized flip up usb vga touchscreen.

So that brings me to this. If I'm going to spend nearly $450 on a motorized usb/vga screen, why not spend a little more and go for the all-in-one double din nav unit, and forget about the car pc all together?

:Sigh:

I need some advice.. I can't find anyone locally to help me fab anything up, adn the guys that ARE willing to do it want soo much money..

Sorry for the long read, but thanks for any advice!

Cliffs:
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1) My carPC project has been a hobby of mine off and on for almost 10 years. It has never seen a day in car STILL...
2) Recently traded in the car, and bought a truck with an extended cab
3) Not much space to work with now, since I don't have a trunk, it will be difficult to install the CarPC
4) If I do keep the CarPC, I will want to buy a motorized flipout touchscreen vga/usb screen from this site.
5) if I do that, I will end up spending like $450. Why not spend a little extra money, and buy an all-in-one double-din unit and forget about the carpc?

Thanks for any advice or comments..