laptop or new hardware - Page 2

Shai-Hulud · 04-26-2007, 07:06 AM

Glad I could help!!

Ruffy · 04-26-2007, 09:16 AM

My setup. Most below has already been said in above posts.

1: Carnetix 2140 DC-DC Unit - If im going to do it I might as well do it right with the flagship product, Powers my screen, my laptop and my usb hub(5v pol addon)

2: HP ZE2000 Laptop - 2ghz amd machine that was under $350 when I bought it years ago, cheap, efficiant, and wasent being used. I upgraded it cheaply too. Also has the added benefit of battery usage and compact size. Soldered a wire to the relay and used an auto-turn on module

3: Silverstone EB01 USB DAC. Will change this in the future but for now I have pretty decent sound.

I dont get the expandability of a PCI slot, but in reality the only thing id use a pci slot for in a carpc enviornment is for a video capture card, and I can still do that via usb. I wouldnt use it for audio as they tend to be noisy(Signal wise). I can always add on a pmcia card to my laptop to expand its features, and theres always usb/firewire.

By using my old laptop I was able to get a pretty high powered carpc without spending that much money on basic components. Why get a 800mhz-1.4ghz Via chip when you can get something that would actually be usefull. i want a setup with all the bells and whistles. Full animation and the ability to do multiple things at once, not a machine that stutters if you come across a flash skin or app. All in all it's alot cheaper than a mini ITX solution built from scratch.

For power, If the laptop uses a standard two pin barrel plug for power, then a Carnetix p1900 or Carnetix p2140 is your best bet. It will provide power for your usb device and the laptop, or your screen and the laptop, or all three if you pay for the Carnetix 5v addon.

If it's a dell or another laptop with a funky power setting then just hop on ebay and buy an auto/air dc-dc adapter for $30-$80. You would still need something to power your screen and usb devices which means either the Carnetix P1900 or the Carnetix P1290.

I was going to go with a dock solution but felt it took up too much space as I want to build a false floor and still have trunk space available.

scandude · 04-26-2007, 10:05 AM

I am going down the Laptop route. I have a IBM X31 Laptop 1.6GHZ mobile processor battery lasts for 3 - 4 hours and has a ATI radeon GFX card and is quite small, has the benefit of built in Wireless, USB 2 and although I havent seen it yet built in bluetooth.

I am powering this up using a 150w inverter connected to lighter socket (which has a maximum of 10amp) I have decided to go the inverter route simply because I would like to run other devices like a AA battery charger, charger for my archos, portable dvd player. The Laptop requires 75w so the 150w inverter should have no problem, another reason for going the inverter route is that I would like to be able to remove the whole install within minutes leaving a very clean de-install this way no one has any ideas that a pc was in the car, and theives will keep away.

I have currently set up the laptop using centrafuse which I found to be a very clean and fast interface.

Although I could have gone the other route I would prefer to carry the laptop with me and move it from car to car or car to home without any major problems and be able to fix any issues in my home rather than having to spend ages removing the pc or having to fix it in the car.

shotgunefx · 04-26-2007, 10:33 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by scandude

...
Although I could have gone the other route I would prefer to carry the laptop with me and move it from car to car or car to home without any major problems and be able to fix any issues in my home rather than having to spend ages removing the pc or having to fix it in the car.

Have you tried the setup out yet? I had a lot of noise issues when I was running an inverter, even a ground loop isolator. YMMV. I

elimenohpee · 04-26-2007, 10:40 AM

I have another good question for you all. If I go the laptop route, I have plenty of room to place it in the trunk (2000 jeep grand cherokee). But I'd really like to have the dvd/rw up front so that I dont have to pull over to throw in a cd. When I was planning the mini-itx route, I was going to have everything in the center console, including the dvd player for convienience. The laptop has one already, so I don't have to buy a seperate player, but do any of you have your laptop somewhere, but your cd player/dvd player up front for convienience? I guess it wouldn't be hard, I'd just need a ribbon to stretch from the front all the way to the back, right?

shotgunefx · 04-26-2007, 11:00 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by elimenohpee

I have another good question for you all. If I go the laptop route, I have plenty of room to place it in the trunk (2000 jeep grand cherokee). But I'd really like to have the dvd/rw up front so that I dont have to pull over to throw in a cd. When I was planning the mini-itx route, I was going to have everything in the center console, including the dvd player for convienience. The laptop has one already, so I don't have to buy a seperate player, but do any of you have your laptop somewhere, but your cd player/dvd player up front for convienience? I guess it wouldn't be hard, I'd just need a ribbon to stretch from the front all the way to the back, right?

Not 100% sure, but think you would have problems with using the built-in.

1. finding such a cable and/or making one with the right connectors,

2. Think it would be too far and you'd get signal issues.

elimenohpee · 04-26-2007, 11:06 AM

Well maybe i can build around it and keep the laptop up front around the center console afterall. That would suck having to stop to pop in a dvd every time!

thebranded · 04-26-2007, 09:01 PM

get a USB case for your current CD/DVD drive and a 3m USB cable with repeater built in.