VW Jetta

**ArmyRover** · 11-03-2008, 08:24 PM

Originally Posted by skuller

wait a second, did you replace the airbag with a carpc?

That would be my take on what he wrote.

Of course I could be wrong and the airbag is behind the computer ready to catapult the computer into the passengers face

**JerzeyLegend** · 11-04-2008, 01:10 AM

Originally Posted by skuller

wait a second, did you replace the airbag with a carpc?

I am sure with mods like his, he has NO intentions of letting others ride in his car.

I wouldn't especially if that screen was on MY door. I would kill someone if they got mine broken.

BTW, I love where you put the flash drive reader. Gonna consider that when I start my build.

**dMand** · 11-05-2008, 05:46 AM

Neck cramps: YES!

it occurs frequently when playing Crysis in the drivers seat.

Absolutely, the Raptors are indeed show quality. While the older models were considered noisy, they were hella fast. Amazingly, with the new VelociRaptor, they're 35% faster, uses less electricity, and gone is the loud chatter they used to make. I'd like to try RAID0 with a pair of VelociRaptors.

To sculler: I decided to use the airbag for a different purpose. However, it's there, but it's NOT tied in with the rest of the safety system.

The airbag is setup with a bypass pressure switch, and triggered by the alarm remote to 'standby' when armed. Among other things, attempting to steal the computer will cause the airbag to explode, catapulting the computer hard drive cover. I'll post a video on UTube of the next would be thief. I usually leave the doors unlocked with the system armed so the glass doesn't have to be broken to gain entry.

**freak3dot** · 11-07-2008, 09:48 AM

Originally Posted by dMand

Internet Access- Here's the ClearWire broadband modem at full signal strength with five lights on, mounted on the rear package tray. It's thin upright profile doesn't hamper my view of looking out the back glass via the rearview mirror. Reception is best when mounted here while streaming video's to your computer.

Although bulkier than the average pc card adapter, at $29.99 a month for unlimited throughput, Clearwire is the obvious choice. Cell phone carriers charge way more per month with a 5 gig download cap at dial-up speed.

I have to disagree. I pay $29.98 for my cell phone internet with unlimited download and VPN support. I have a tmobile cell phone plan. It is $9.99 to have the extra phone on my family plan. Then it is $19.99 for the unlimited VPN internet add-on. I currently use this at home because I didn't want to pay outragous fees to cable or phone company. I have used it to download linux distos and never hit a limit or extra fees. There is one thing I found interesting though. On the bill, that phone was using more text messages than I thought. Good thing I have unlimited text on my family plan too. That might be where they get you.

You can also teather a tmobile cell phone with just tzones internet which is like $5.99 a month but you have to use tmobile's proxy which requires some setup and some programs just don't have proxy configuration options.

I hope this helps someone and sorry if off topic.

**dMand** · 11-08-2008, 03:49 PM

freakdot, that's pretty decent rates for phone service and internet.

With your t-mobile phone tethered to a carpc for internet access, can you video conference with others using messenger?

If you can, PM me with your email address, and let's V/C from car pc to car pc.

**BlueOvalMacMech** · 11-08-2008, 06:20 PM

dMand, i checked out the above regarding the leds. you said you switched to led headlights as well? where did you source those from and how do they do?

**dMand** · 11-08-2008, 07:12 PM

Blue oval, I was referring to these bulbs mounted in the headlight housing of the Jetta, one on each side, and they work great.

hope that answers your question

**BlueOvalMacMech** · 11-08-2008, 08:50 PM

ahhh ok. i thought you had meant led headlights (which i've seen in development and cannot wait for mainstream).

for the led bulbs, you might be interested in a thread from a forum i'm a big part of, we have a member that is in diehard love with leds, and has been keeping up with them.
the style above is old gen. the newer ones are much better.

check it out.

http://www.grandmarq.net/85crownLX/pages/LEDs.html

**dMand** · 11-08-2008, 09:52 PM

Blue, i'm looking out for LED high and low beams too, but, those are some wicked looking lights in the link you provided. Thanks for sharing!

**dMand** · 12-11-2008, 06:56 PM

My car puter project is alive again. It's time to share a few upgrades/enhancements that I'll be performing.

Up on today's list of things to do is replace the WD Raptor150 "D- Drive".

While the speed of this drive is great, the capacity is not large enough to hold my growing multimedia collection. Besides, BestBuy sent me a $50.00 rebate to use within two weeks, so I had to think of something soon.

What I had hoped for came through, their hard drives went on sale. The drive I wanted retails for $239, on sale it dropped down to $209. I then took another $50 off. I walked out the door with a Seagate Barracuda for $172 dollars, tax included.

Here's the drive that will replace the Raptor.

I couldn't resist, 172 dollars divided by (1.5TB or) 1,500 gigs, equals to approximately 00.11 cents per gigabyte! Anyhow, it's a steal if I'd say so myself with a 32MB buffer.

Next on today's agenda is to swap out the 8500GT video card

with a factory overclocked 8600GTS, sporting a 710Mhz clock that I had laying around collecting dust.

The two cards are next each other for comparison:

As seen in the illustration above, the 8600GTS has a "Y" cable, six pin molex, that requires a minimum of seventy-five watts of external power in order for it to work.

Here's where I need your technical expertise, I want this beast to function properly in my system since it's just laying around doing nothing.

In order to keep things within tolerance, BFG suggested a 450watt power supply on a dual core setup, however, my PSU is only a DCX6-320w.

I've not seen a vehicle DC power supply larger than 360 watts in the market. Is there such a thing? I've googled to no avail.

I was thinking along the lines of juicing the 12volt input on the dual molex connector with fused power directly from the car. Would It be safe doing this with a 7.5 amp fuse?

I've thrown in the white flag, but haven't surrendered yet.

"Where there's a will, there's a way."

What are your thoughts?