galvitron

Okay everybody! My turbo-grocery-getter is gettin' an upgrade! Have most of my parts and I thought it would be a good idea to show off the process.

What I am going for is a completely contained in-dash PC in a double din opening. I just got a raise so I splurged on some nicer parts. Unfortunately I couldn't get a 6.5" touchscreen by itself so I went with the WRX 7" bolt in. This screen will be replaced when I get a 6.5...

So anyways, here's the parts:

Commell LS-372 rebranded as Global American Inc. 3307820 <---nice folks



Core 2 Duo T7500 2.2 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 4M cache



2 GB SO-DIMM 667 MHz (PC5300)



M2-ATX and wall adapter




and all the cables and screws and junk



and the screen, of course



I also have a laptop drive as a temporary solution until the solid state SATA drives come down in price. Also to be added:

- nLite-ed XP install
- GPS
- Radio (HQCT or HD? don't know yet...)
- CD/DVD in the glovebox
- Custom front-end written by me (I like to reinvent the wheel)

I forgot to buy thermal paste so I will show it assembled when I get it.

Thanks for your attention...carry on and check back soon!

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galvitron

Powered up last night for the first time on my workbench with straight 12V regulated into the MB. Boots up fine. I will install windows tonight. Looks like my M2-ATX may be bad...need to run more tests...

I have the M2 connected to a 12V laptop style wall adapter. 12V out from the brick goes to IGN and VIN on the M2 and GRND from brick to GRND on M2. I have an LED and hard drive plugged into the M2 but neither power up when ignition is switched on...don't know what is going on...

I will go try and read all of the M2 threads and see what I can find...

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DarquePervert

From your other thread, I think you may have this sorted out.

Honestly, the M2ATX for your setup would not be the ideal solution, IMHO.
A 12v regulator (like the Carnetx P1290) would be a simpler solution.

The M2 setup is just kinda kluugey IMHO, although it will work...

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galvitron

Yeah, I know the M2 is not ideal. But I got it for cheap. Later I may swap it. I have a mini-itx that may go in another car later on that can use it if I buy a better PSU.

So you think the P1290 is ideal for this? I will look into it.

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mrbean_phillip

Ah, finally someone with this little gem of a board too

I got one from Synrax Australia, original branded Commell LS-372, for the princely sum of $389 Aud.....I am still awaiting the CPU, although I picked a T7100, and 1gig PIQ ram I picked up in Bangkok 2 weeks ago - IT Fortune Plaza is real nice.

Well, seeing I have a MAc-Mini as my carputer, I may use this as a developemental testbed for my WinXP Embedded endeavours, as this board is much more suitable (in terms of size) than the other board I own, the LS-677.

I will watch this with keen interest, good luck!

Pity these are single-channel (memory) only, but it should still be hectically fast!

edit: May I ask a favor, please? Can you see how long it take for the board to:
1) POST - ie from the time you hit the power, until it displays text on screen
2)Same as above, but until it flashes last screen and begins loading XP (at XP scroll bar)

I would appreciate this!

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galvitron

Time from hitting power to first text on screen is about 3 seconds. This includes the time it takes for my monitor to wake up.

Time from first power hit to XP logo is about 9 seconds.

It is a shame about single channel memory, but the trade off is size. And in reality this thing is still super fast. There isn't really any boards that are faster than this unless you go big...

I am VERY happy with this board. Everything is working perfectly for me with the exception of 800X480 res (working on that now).

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mrbean_phillip

Hey,
Thanx for the feedback - the times you are reporting are certainly a lot quicker than my Commell LV-677 setup - I am looking forward to (finally) receive my CPU for this little board, and start with my Embedded OS design (WinXPE)

It now seems clear that we should be hitting desktop in around 15-18 seconds from powering on, which is great, and a very minimal delay to start using the puter - and yes, I am talking standard WinXP, not even nLite'd or embedded - so, for these special cases, we might be looking 12-15 seconds - bloody hell, it would be great.

Yes, although dual-channel would have been ideal, without much sacrifice in space, this is still probably the best board outh there right now for caprputers - small, and very, very powerful.

It lends itself excellently to people out there who wants to engineer/supply decent carputers for the future

I will prolly receive my cpu early next week, and assist in sorting 800x480 issues, as I have a Xenarc T700TSV lying around....

Keep us posted, as mentioned earlier, I am fervently watching this one!

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jamesavery22

galvitron,
where did you purchase the ls-372 from? Direct from Global American?

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mrbean_phillip

@ Galvitron: re your M2-ATX - I remember having issues with my M2-ATX not powering my Commell LV-677 properly, it started spinning the cpu fan, then, before POST, would shut down the board - yours the same symptoms?

If so, I will provide a linky to a mod I had to do to fix the problem - basically replacing a small smd capacitor that alters the timing on the on-pulse.....

Let me know.

edit: Here's the link anyway, hope it helps.

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galvitron

@mrbean_phillip Another great thing about this board is that it is not hot at all. I left the thing on all day and the northbridge heatsink was hotter than the CPU heatsink. Both wer just warm, not hot. When I add the SSD (when they get cheaper) I think I can get it down to like 11 or 12 seconds. I may even go so far as to modify the BIOS to go faster by having it assume that certain hardware is always there. But that is a difficult road to go down and it may not be worth it. I am going to have it not autodetect the drives and stuff to get it to boot faster. For now, I am concentrating on 800X480 and the M2. I posted over in the 945 800X480 driver mod thread so follow that when you get your screen.

@jamesavery22 I got it from Global American. When I got it they had 2 in stock so I would try and jump on it right away because the lead time on getting these from Taiwan is a few weeks I think. They have a good engineering staff too and they can recommend and build the entire CPU/MB/RAM combo and test it for you.

@mrbean_phillip Thanks for the link. That sounds like exactly the same issue! I am out of town now but when I get back I will try it again. I will post results here.

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mrbean_phillip

No worries, I'll check out the vga-thread

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jamesavery22

Ouch, $342.14 for the board? Was hoping it was cheaper than BWI's $353.75. I guess I should be happy for the $11

galvitron

Well this is definitely not a cheap board and shouldn't be used for budget systems. But if you can afford it, it is one of the best out there.

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jamesavery22

As long as it performs as advertised I definitely feel its worth it. Have you played with the HDMI output much? namely pumping 1080p to something? Do you know if the audio through HDMI works as well?

galvitron

I haven't used it and I probably won't because I don't have a 1080p TV. I am not sure about the sound. Is there a way to tell by just looking at the connector?

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