Thread: FAQ: How do climate extremes affect a Car PC?

What if you were to just install fans on a case that's designed to be fanless? Wouldn't that theoretically provide more than enough cooling?
Hell, I bet one of these [URL=http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/accessories/5dee/]USB fans[/USB] would do the trick. I use 'em to cool down home theater components, because my Directv box has a USB port.
Of course, that still means you're really just blowing hot air around.
What if you ducted the AC to the trunk, but not directly into the case? Would that still cause condensation?

That would depend on what the internal temp for the trunk got to. Not to mention, the trunk is probably one of the hotest compartments on a midsummers day. The warming of that compartment will create some degree of moisture, it's just a matter of "how much".

I work in Networking with computers and I found this post really interesting since I working on my own carputer (04 TL). Unless you wan't to control the AC temperature that goes in the PC, you can just be sure to have a AIR FLOW in the PC's case.

What I mean by "AIR FLOW" is, even if it's WARM or COLD air it as to move in the case. The easy way to do so, is to install atleast 2 computer fans in your carputer case.

The first FAN as to push some air inside the case....
The second FAN as to pull out the air outside the case....

This will create an AIR FLOW in the computer's case and keep the hardware at a respectable temperature.

I live in Montreal, Québec. The temperature here is never the same, in winter it can get as low as -30C and during summer we usualy have some +30 really often. SO that's why temperature is a major problem for me. I'll let you guys know when I will run all my carputer tests.

VMTSQUAD

Just thought I would add that I use my car PC all year round and it gets -40 celsius here a few times a winter every single year. I find everything will work and function normally except the hard drive won't spin unless it's above -15 or -10 somewhere, so ultimately it won't boot. But all other components seem to work.

Okay. Yes, this is an old thread. But I figure my post is relevant here.

Given my experience, I seem to get about 3 years out of a mini ITX board. Although it's not specific to mini ITX, the wide temperature changes (specifically mentioned in this post) do eventually cause issues and failures. I have done it twice. I live in southern Ontario. I use a remote car starter. While that will help with the temperature related erratic behavior of the touch screen before I get in the car, and I use a SSD (regular HDs didn't like extreme cold), I still experienced failed solder joints after a while.

Laptops, and probably tablets, probably withstand more stress.

Also, my rear monitor gave up also after about 3 years. Yes, probably coincidence, but still......

Given that industrial grade PC boards and monitors are quite expensive, replacing regular grade boards every 3 years is still cheaper. And since many of us like to keep our hardware up-to-date, it's probably something we can all live with.

Cheers.

Same area as you, just a little more north. I use a ssd for boot drive and wd black 2.5" for media. This winter I used this little gizmo on the wd http://www.sparkfun.com/products/11288 and seemed to work just fine. Left it powered as a standalone item with a timer 30mins on 30mins off, no problems with battery drain or hard drive problems. SNO

Interesting. I wonder if a couple of those would extend the life of the motherboard reducing the temperature extremes in winter.

They also make a bigger one not much but bigger. Give it a try they are cheap enough. I'm using a jetway nf-93r-lf board currently previous was a industrial msi ms-9818 board that failed after 2 years of service. SNO