Thread: Factory vs. Aftermarket?

Originally Posted by Booger

After much browsing, googling, and forum reading, I've decided that a car pc may not really be the best fit for me. The first time I rode in my sister's Acura TSX with a factory setup, I knew I wanted something similar. I haven't found any aftermarket solution that can match it. It seems that car pc's can come close, but still have a few drawbacks. Namely:

1. Instant on. Most of my trips are < 10-15 minutes as I live close to work and most everywhere else I frequent. A disk based hard drive spooling up every time I start the car just won't cut it.

2. Hard buttons. All the main functions can be activated by hitting a hard button. I hate touch screens because every time you use them, they get horribly dirty. I have a PDA phone and I have to clean the screen after almost every phone call. Drives me nuts.

3. Front end. Even my technophobe sister has no issues with her factory system. I want to enjoy my stereo, not always be troubleshooting it. Trust me, I've gone this route already with the pc vs. tivo issue. It took me 6 months to get my media pc tweaked to my liking.

The big drawback for me is lack of storage. I have 60 gigs of MP3's that I'd like to access. Again, the Acura system I like so much has an ipod dock that is an acceptable solution given the trade-offs.


Ok, now that I've made my points, has anyone ever retrofitted an OEM system to a vehicle it wasn't intended for? In this case, it'd be going into a 1999 Jeep Cherokee. With some serious modding, it should fit into the dash console. What other considerations are there?

Secondly, where can I get the factory stereo? Is $2k from the stealership my only option? Not like I can head on down to the junkyard and pry one out of a wrecked one.

Ebay

Damn near impossible, and certainly not worth the time.

Oem units interface into NUMEROUS other systems in the car. Some are important to the operation of the unit, and can not be duplicated in your vehicle.

Better to take the time to get a carputer to a point you like it. The integration of carputers is getting better all the time. Boot times can be reduced to under 20 seconds easily, and hard buttons can be added as well, and it isn't that hard, and for a lot less then 2000 plus materials, and the massive amount of time that a retrofit will take.

Michael

Originally Posted by Booger

Aside from a faster computer, what can I do to decrease boot times? Linux? I caught a thread on here about loading windows onto a CF card. I think that's a definite must. Can you point me in the right direction? Thanks for the help.

CF booting will not make it faster. Only more reliable. Get a deep cycle battery in a tank circuit and put it in standby. Instant-on. Problem fixed.

As for hard buttons, look at the phidgets. They plug in the usb port, can be daisy chained up to 128 devices as per the USB standard. Rotary knobs, push buttons, everything. Problem solved.

The only reason you would troubleshoot your system is if you screw it up. I put mine in, and since it has been fine. Took about a weekend of putting it in the car, and loading software. Worked "out-of-the-box" even though built it all myself. No real problem anyways.

And as Michael said, no. It is not worth your time to do it. And since it is an Acura it is a Honda. And since it is a newer system it is more advanced then my stock HU. I have an '01, and the radio is integral to the car. If it does not recieve the correct code from the ECU, it shuts itself off. It also immobilizes the car so the fuel pump doeesn't work and the key's RF signal doesn't work. The last part wont matter since you just wont use that part, but basically you will need a second ECU to emulate the Acura to make it think it is not stolen. And even then, since it won't be recieving accurate data regarding the car (speed and such), it may shut itself off.

So no it is not possible to transplant a stereo from one car to another without some major reworking of the unit, and then it would become pointless because of the price. Might as well just buy a new car or a carputer.

There are certain processes that a computer has to go through regardless of OS. The POST is one. You can decrease the time it takes for the computer to POST, but you can't get eliminate it.

One option is to use standby mode on a computer instead of powering it off. It will reduce startup times down to mere seconds, depending on the hardware.
However, standby mode requires constant power to the system to maintain the state, which could drain your battery if you don't start the vehicle for several days.

Another option (which I use) is hibernation. It does not require power to maintain the state, as the state is written to the hard drive. On my setup, I go from ignition to music in under 30 seconds.

I've been using the standby as a test and surprisingly, it works remarkably well. There is the battery issue but on my Carnetix p1900 I set the "Deadman timer" to true which will shut down power to the pc after 3 days.. or if the batter voltage drops below 10 volts. If you dont use your car for three days then a 30 second boot up shouldnt hurt you as you should warm up your car anyways. If you drive almost every day then standby would work just fine and my screen turns on, gps locked, position plotted, music playing, in 5 seconds after ignition.

Originally Posted by Booger

I know post times can vary dramatically between setups. As I understand it (not well), the motherboard bios can play a large role. How can I evaluate motherboards with fast post as my goal? I'll be using a Core 2 Duo Mobile T7400 cpu. Overkill, I know, but I get the Intel employee discount.

If you leave the computer in standby, then it will only need to go through POST from a cold boot.

Originally Posted by Booger

S3 standby? Humnnnn. I do have that on my media pc and it's very slick.

Yes standby is S3. It is slick. Best option for you. As long as you have your video drivers installed, and above 98SE, you have S3 option.

Originally Posted by Booger

30 seconds is TOO LONG. Thanks for the input.

30 seconds is from hibernate and that is not with a core 2 duo either. I get from cold boot to music in about 20 seconds. Of course usually it is in standby though so instantaneous music. About 1 second from the M2's built in delay, and then the screen turns on, turns blue, and shows the login screen all within about a half second, and then music plays. Music is going even if not logged in. Then when you login you get the windows login sound and everything is still going. It is actually faster than the old HU I had which took between 10 and 20 seconds to "boot". It would say hello, and then it would try to read the mp3 disk, and all the folders, and it was slow.