Something to show

timekiller · 08-09-2005, 10:28 PM

Noticed that nobody seems to have a conplete system to show off here, so here ya go:

https://www.timekiller.org/carpc/

Lemme know what you guys think

simon_C · 08-09-2005, 11:06 PM

wow thats really neat. really innovative and creative!

i like it.

Bugbyte · 08-09-2005, 11:10 PM

That's sweet. Nice touch with the streaming TV.

shizzle · 08-09-2005, 11:39 PM

Very nice install.... I am most impressed with the factory look, and how it is placed, but all that coding and configuring had to be the behemoth task.
You are an inspiration.

pkg · 08-10-2005, 11:48 AM

That is a great setup you have going.

And you are in a Mazda 3 sport! We should race! Well maybe e-race :P

I am very impressed with your setup, what is your core distro?

timekiller · 08-10-2005, 11:57 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by shizzle

but all that coding and configuring had to be the behemoth task.
You are an inspiration.

All the configuration did take time, especially getting Direct Rendering working, but ready for a shocker?

I did NO coding. I put this together with software already out there. Granted I modified the hell out of things. Like the MythTV UI and theme. But the closest I came to coding was a bunch of Bash scripts to handle all the behind the scenes stuff.

timekiller · 08-10-2005, 11:58 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by pkg

I am very impressed with your setup, what is your core distro?

Gentoo - I use it for everything. In fact I even have my fiance on it. I am happy to report that my home is 100% Winblows free

Rireal · 08-12-2005, 12:42 PM

I saw you were looking to work on a EPIA Gentoo write in the future. I would love to read through this. I tried (and installed) Gentoo on mine but like you said, it was a pain in the ***. I'm currently running win98 just for the fast load times but I would love to hear from someone to who has gotten Gentoo working (and seemingly flawlessly).

LavaJoe · 08-12-2005, 05:09 PM

Quote: Originally Posted by timekiller

Noticed that nobody seems to have a conplete system to show off here, so here ya go:

https://www.timekiller.org/carpc/

Lemme know what you guys think

VERY Nice! I wrote a python MP3 front end (see thread on this forum), since I couldn't find a good music browser out there - sounds like Myth is cool - hadn't seen that one.

Did you manage to get 800x480 working? My only concern about 4:3 resolutions would be video/TV, which would appear "squashed" (or is there a way around that in the player?).

-Joe

tom61 · 08-12-2005, 06:28 PM

Impressive! How much does EV-DO cost you? I'd be content streaming music to my car, but you're streaming video!

intuitionsys · 08-15-2005, 04:03 PM

Okay seeing as the proverbial gauntlet has been thrown down:

http://www.intuitionsys.com/index_proj_curr.html

I'm doing everything timekiller is doing except live streaming. I upload videos to my system for viewing instead. I really like his control pad setup but I just can't bring myself to hack up the console on such an expensive car

I'm currently coding the touchscreen interface so that should be a good compromise. I'm also thinking about using a CrystalFontz control pad too, but the remote works great for now just not as slick as timkiller's

The site needs updating but most of the info on the system is there. The biggest hurdle I had to do with mine was synchronizing to the OEM screen in the FX35 that is a fixed-frequency 15kHz RGBS instead of a regular 31kHz+ RGB/HS/VS VGA type monitor.

pkg · 08-15-2005, 04:13 PM

Yeah, it looks like timekiller has started it. I am gonna have to put mine up now

(though mine isnt quite ready but it is getting there)

xGumbyx · 08-21-2005, 10:18 PM

Do you still use the Clarion LCD? I've been told that text on non vga monitors is virtually unusable. How is this monitor when viewing text? ie: is a linux desktop like fluxbox or even kde usable? I've had a look at some of your photos on your website and it looks decent but most of what I have seen is a mythtv ui frontend that is made specifically for TV's. Would something like xmms or amorok be usable?

Thanks for any info you can give me. Your setup looks pretty sweet.

Gumby

pkg · 08-22-2005, 07:41 PM

Quote: Originally Posted by xGumbyx

Do you still use the Clarion LCD? I've been told that text on non vga monitors is virtually unusable. How is this monitor when viewing text? ie: is a linux desktop like fluxbox or even kde usable? I've had a look at some of your photos on your website and it looks decent but most of what I have seen is a mythtv ui frontend that is made specifically for TV's. Would something like xmms or amorok be usable?

Thanks for any info you can give me. Your setup looks pretty sweet.

Gumby

From the work that I have done with my XGA+ screen (better res) I feel that a full desktop isnt really suitable for a car environment (7" screen). I was running gnome and with some tweaking I was able to get it relatively usable but it was still uncomfortable. xmms was problematic because of the font size and button layout. Maybe a better skin for xmms would have helped though.

Small screen UI is a unique problem. The fonts have to be bigger, the interaction needs to be done with 1 or 2 steps, most of the time a keyboard or standard mouse isn't available. Solutions to these problems can come from interesting sources (e.g. mythtv). Another issue with car UI is the fact that everything needs to be done with minimal attention from the driver. My solution was to write my own.

Keep up with what you are doing though, make the system your own. Keep us posted.

intuitionsys · 08-23-2005, 02:54 PM

I can't stress enough how much better result you'll get if you develop the interface (and backends, daemons, etc. where necessary) from scratch. My interface probably isn't the prettiest but it is VERY readable even with some very small type. I'm running at 800x480 since that's what my OEM monitor's native resolution is.

Using a font editor to rework fonts to suit the GUI helps too. I use the Blue Highway family alot for it's readability and use an edited version of it with all the numbers monospaced for certain places where it displays better and is easier to read on a small display. Alot of "1's" next to each other in a 12 or 14 pt font on a 7" display can be awfully hard to read if they aren't monospaced.