Thread: FAQ Poll: How much did your car PC cost?

pc alone in mine was 2000 new

I have the whole alpine touchscreen mm head/nav setup..... still went over $1,500 on the pc end of it..... it's not a matter of either/or sometimes

I go back and forth between: should I have spent money on an indash aftermarket unit or built a custom pc. Currently, with all the little minor problems including having a my dash apart for days at a time and no music I'd choose in-dash nav.

But when my car pc's togeather, I'd choose in custom pc. It has SO many unique features and the ability to make it do anything you want.

I ditto what a lot of folks say about "too much" and "would've been much more if not for all those who have gone before. So technically, it was a bargain. My screen cost about 1/2 of the entire rig.

I put about $1200 in, but some of it was development and R&D. I'll spend more, but that's half the fun.

If you're looking for advice, I'd say start with the monitor, and then decide what will fit where. Then build accordingly. Sounds stupid, but put a breif budget together with all the things you might want. If you don't, you'll all of a sudden remember you have to get Nav software for like $100 and that might suck.

I was probably on the low end because the actual carputer is an old system that I had laying around. That was the cost for PS, SDC, Inverter, screen, HD, wiring, keyboard, slot load DVD, etc.

Michael

Originally Posted by Bugbyte

Nice. Power supply was free too?

....except for that but I still did prety well I think

I've just this weekend finished getting it working in the car - no where near finished although all the big expense is over now. All in all i've spent at least £1000 GBP and I believe that I'll have about another £250 to get my video blackbox system ready so in the terms of this thread this makes it in the $1500 and over. But that said I know I could have done it cheaper as I went for everything M/B, HDDs, DVD Drive, RAM, Case, USB hubs, power etc new and specifc for the car especially as I went for an indash motorised touchscreen and the Jabors VW Audio interface those two combined cost in excess of £400.

I'd hate to think about the extra hidden costs of the things I've bought and not used like a 50x50cm 3mm thick steel plate that I was going to cut up and mount the PC on but I decided to go instead for a specific readymade case.

I wish I hadn't thought about it now I'm getting depressed - must go and play with my new toy

Interesting results! With 78 responses, 46 people spent $1,000 or more while 32 spent under $1,000. Amongst the +$1,000 response, the distribution was pretty flat as the price went up.

If you haven't voted yet, go ahead and vote in the next week. I'll probably close the poll out either then or if we go over 100 responses.

I don't know the exact number but once you put all the hardware/software together, the number will be more than 1.2K+.
That number including all primer, paints, bodyfiller, bandage, bandaid, wires/cable, fuses ... well, basically all the small stuff that aren't free.