So I guess where I am going, and going, and going, is....

1) Have fun! There are 1000's of ways to spend a lot of money here! lol

2) It doesn't have to cost $1000 to look like it did.

3) Never lock yourself into an idea. Always look at changes. I would love to lock my monitor down with something like epoxy, but knowing it might change, everything is held in with silicon. Handles vibration well and can easily be removed.

4) One big difference between laptops and carputer is vibration. I used to ride with a laptop mounted on a stand. Went through 2 harddrives before I gave it up. Probably be ok if you put some isolation under it. Another downside to laptops. Not very upgradable, limited ports.

5) Upside to laptops is minimal space required, made to be fast in a compact size, and you already have one.

6) On a monitor, I watched e-bay for months and when I found the monitor at over $100 less than everywhere else, thats when I started my build. I think on a van, a bigger screen would really cool, but I'm not recommending it.

7) Furnish your garage. Once you get started with this, the wife will send you there to sleep often! But dang, is it fun!