Newfie Newbie

Cjirodin · 07-30-2007, 05:29 PM

Hey All,

Greetings from The Rock eh...

I have been an onlooker of the forum for a few months now. Reading threads here led me to start my own project. I went as low budget as I could on my car and computer. I have a basic description below of what I have done so far with much more to come, hopefully. I have worked with computers for years, but never was much for DC wiring or any type of car installation.

Two things bug me a bit about the whole car install so far:

The first of which pertains to lines in the display of my screen. I have tried several settings in the screen options and tried all the refresh rates I could. The best looking one is 70Hz, but I am still getting visible distortion (especially on solid backgrounds). I thought I read something about hooking the power from the computer supply instead of straight to the car. Any ideas?

The second thing is the available front-ends. It doesn't seem that any of them are really what I am looking for asthetically. I am a multimedia developer by trade and would like to see an interface with a bit more interactivity/life in it. I guess my question here is, could Adobe Flash be used as a viable frontend option? I really can't see whynot myself from my using it for web development purposes. It can be made to play songs, videos & external media of pretty much any kind. The main concern is probably GPS and/or Satelite Radio as far as I can tell. Any opinions?

Anyways, hats off to the pioneers of this stuff, I'll probably post some pics of
my newbie install as soon as the sound system is in.

Car Computer: (Mostly made from leftover parts)

Installed in an old suitcase and fastened in the trunk.

Intel Pentium III 866Mhz, 512 MB SD Ram, Geforce MX 440 Video Card, On-board Sound, USB 2.0 PCI Card (Wired 4 Port HUB mounted under dash), Wireless G PCI card with wired antenna in back window. QWERTY handheld keyboard, M2-ATX power supply, VM7000 7" Touchscreen mounted using included dashtop kit embeded in car stereo bay.

Soon to Come:

1000w AMP and woofer with 4 channel 250w AMP powering custom speakers (For now)

Cheers,

Cjir

nammertat · 07-30-2007, 05:51 PM

Hello,

After much tinkering with my Xenarc, I've found that 60hz was a viable spot to settle. It isn't perfect, but its rare that I see any distortion. AS for your front end issue, its really hard to fall for anything but roadrunner. If you're after something you can put your own creative spin on, you could always use roadrunner to host up your own java-based programs.

good luck!

2k1Toaster · 07-30-2007, 06:01 PM

I think RoadRunner with loads of flash elements would be your best bet aesthetically. However your CPU wont be able to handle it I can tell you that now. Flash is nice, but bloated so if you have the power use it, and you dont really. Go ahead and try though because you may be able to cut down other services.

There was a heavy flash skin developed that everyone seemed to love but it fell out for some reason and was never finished. And the developer has never posted his source. If you could create a nice flash skin for Roadrunner, you would be hailed as a god from many people.

Cjirodin · 07-31-2007, 02:17 PM

60Hz seems to make the lines a bit farther apart, but doesn't really make them and less apparent. I am going to check on some of the wiring to se if that could be causing it.

As for the flash Idea. I started reading more into it and a complete flash front-end seems unlikely. I wouldn't mind doing the graphical end of it, but heavy programming is a lot like kryptonite to me. Anyone know where I can find some info on how to make skins for RR?

Nevermind, Should have looked before I posted. I'll see what I can do about making a skin. Thanks