Thread: Scion xB '06, in-dash Atom 330, Lilliput 889GL; details, pictures, links. Index: pg 1

New Garage Space

We've hardly gotten any work done on the cars, for a couple of reasons. One of the major ones is that -- at last -- the new garage project is finally rolling. The house is on the side of a hill, and underneath the back bedrooms is a huge space -- 22 x 24 feet (~6.7m x 7.3m) with a nearly 10 foot (~3m) ceiling. The walls are poured concrete on all sides, but there's a small opening into the house so we can get in there. We've thought it would be wonderful workspace, so we decided to cut a hole in the back wall, put in a garage door and a concrete floor, and have a new shop.

After looking at the difficulties involved in cutting a garage-door size hole in a 10-inch (~250mm) thick wall, we came to the conclusion it would be a good idea to have professionals do it, and it's happening this week. To prepare for that, we took the siding and underlayment off the wall where the hole will go.

The concrete cutters will also cut the wall away around the small opening into the house so we can install a standard 36-inch (~0.9m) wide door there. After the wall cutters are done, a contractor will clear out the extra dirt in there, pour a new floor and pour a new 22 x 24 foot pad in front of the garage door. Then we'll take over.

We have to frame in and install the garage door and the door into the house, add a new wiring panel off the main one, install lights and power outlets, add a power garage door opener, drywall the ceiling, add a natural-gas-fired heater, and plumb in a washup sink. We'll be busy at that for quite a while. Once we're done, we'll have an excellent place to work. It'll be warm in the winter, and -- because it faces north -- cool in the summer.

rdholtz, I love how massive this thread has grown. There's plenty of detail in here to keep us all amused for hours (in a good way, of course )

The preamp looks great! I didn't even consider a preamp for my system and just assumed it would all work, and it does work, but I'm wondering if adding a preamp would improve the overall sound quality? I'm at the stage where my car PC does everything I need it to, and now I'm just fiddling with what else I can make it do.

Haven't visited for awhile and thought I had better drop in and check progress. I have just bought a new 2 me 4x4 suv, A '96 Isuzu Wizzard - in the US I think they are the Isuzu Rodeo. The problem I now have is that the dash is going to need major mods to get a screen in there, I may have to look at a motorised screen. Hopefully I can find a motorised screen with disc drive that will talk to a pc. Then all I need to find is the money for that and all the other toys I want.

Keep up the good work you continue to inspire!

Captcol

Originally Posted by MeeM

rdholtz, I love how massive this thread has grown. There's plenty of detail in here to keep us all amused for hours (in a good way, of course )

Well, it sure hasn't grown much lately. We've been up our necks at work, and every spare moment of building time is being invested in the new workspace. I've read what's going on, but haven't posted for over a month. And it'll be a bit before we can get back to work on the carPCs.

Originally Posted by MeeM

The preamp looks great! I didn't even consider a preamp for my system and just assumed it would all work, and it does work, but I'm wondering if adding a preamp would improve the overall sound quality? I'm at the stage where my car PC does everything I need it to, and now I'm just fiddling with what else I can make it do.

The ones we built have been working just fine. I don't think they're the sort of device an audiophile would build, but -- for my car -- it's doing an absolutely terrific job.

Originally Posted by captcol

Haven't visited for awhile and thought I had better drop in and check progress. I have just bought a new 2 me 4x4 suv, A '96 Isuzu Wizzard - in the US I think they are the Isuzu Rodeo. The problem I now have is that the dash is going to need major mods to get a screen in there, I may have to look at a motorised screen. Hopefully I can find a motorised screen with disc drive that will talk to a pc. Then all I need to find is the money for that and all the other toys I want.

Keep up the good work you continue to inspire!

Captcol

Congratulations on the new rig. I've been pondering what vehicle to build up in our new shop, and I'm thinking it will likely be a truck, maybe an '80's Chevy pickup with a turbo'd V6. I'd like a turbo'd V8, but it's rare to see a Chevy V8 turbo that's reliable. My idea would be to build it as a daily driver that had some pep when wanted, but gets pretty good fuel economy if I keep my foot out of it.

Of course, it would need a carPC, and I suspect I'd have a problem similar to yours: where to put it. I've considered motorized screens, but decided I don't even object to manual screens. The manual version helps keep the breakability lower, and it drops the budget, too.

Originally Posted by captcol

Haven't visited for awhile and thought I had better drop in and check progress. I have just bought a new 2 me 4x4 suv, A '96 Isuzu Wizzard - in the US I think they are the Isuzu Rodeo. The problem I now have is that the dash is going to need major mods to get a screen in there, I may have to look at a motorised screen. Hopefully I can find a motorised screen with disc drive that will talk to a pc. Then all I need to find is the money for that and all the other toys I want.

Keep up the good work you continue to inspire!

Captcol

http://www.xenarc.com/product/MDT-X7000.html

Very nice screen, perfect for what I want to do as long as it pops out far enough to go around the dash recess, only problem is that it is nearly 1k in my currency, can't see me getting that past the accountant for awhile

Hey RD, how you been! We havent heard from you in a while!

Originally Posted by ZX1Cruizer

Hey RD, how you been! We haven't heard from you in a while!

Yep, it's been almost a month. My semi-completed carPC is along for the ride, right now. It mostly just needs a bezel, but I've been putting that off 'til we get our new workspace organized.

On the carPC, there are a few things I've noticed that will probably get changed when I get back into them:

(1) There is no switch to simply leave the carPC off. That was an intentional omission; I thought I'd run it all the time. But I miss that feature; if I just want to move the car, I have to wait for the entire boot cycle and then tell it to do a shutdown.

(2) The cooling fans are way too powerful for the amount of heat generated. I think I'll return them to being controlled by the mainboard, and drop them from 12V to 3.3V so they turn at a much more leisurely pace. They sound like small turbines, right now, and the air coming from them rarely gets above ambient.

(3) The auxiliary battery system takes far longer to recharge than I had expected, and longer than my initial tests indicated. I've said I didn't need a larger alternator, but the small stock one works hard to keep up if I leave the carPC running for a while. I suspect the monster cooling fans are an issue, here, and using lower and intermittent power on them may help this situation, too.

(4) I think I'd like remote access from the house network, so I can work on the carPC -- for such things as updating Centrafuse Auto -- from my desk, rather than sitting in the car. I think a Wake-On-LAN feature would be good, so I can start the PC when I want to do that without going out to start it in the car, but maybe that's just pure laziness, eh?

(5) The DVD player/burner I installed has never been used, and I doubt that any future installations will include one.

Overall the carPC has been very useful, primarily for the NAV capability when I need to find some place I've never been, or need to route around a traffic snarl. It's also been very nice on trips.

I'm getting a little itchy to put the bezel in, but I want to finish the new workspace first. All the construction work is complete, and we've moved some of our stuff from the garage to the shop. I need to finish building the shelving, and get it sanded and painted. Once we can actually finish moving in and get our tools and supplies and parts sorted out, it'll be a the best shop either of us have ever owned. We'll be able to pull the car in, work in comfort with plenty of space, with the tools right where we need them. The girls will have their own garage (the original one) that they can actually park in, too, instead of having their space eaten up by our "stuff". Everybody wins.

Great to hear from you. I was getting worried since you are one of the hardcore MP3Car people, you write every little detail.

1) That switch is a must. I actually have 2. 1 is to shut off the ACC from triggering the PC if im only moving the car for a second. All though I will say that the new Windows 7 with Hybrid Sleep, eliminates the wait with instant on. The second switch is so I can run the PC with the engine off and not have to use a key.

2) If they are being powered by 12V, yes they sound like turbines, and if you have them in an inclosed space, they are even louder. I also notice the smaller the fan the louder. Have you tried putting them on the 5V rail instead? That usually fixes the issue.

3) This was an issue I had with my install. The PC is unloading the battery faster then the alternator can power it. I have a 135 amp alternator and when the PC would be on, you can see my electrical system was having issues. Ive decided to go to a dual battery setup (I said I wouldnt, but I have no choice at this point) and I found a company that makes Police alternators for my truck. It produces 200 Amps at idle and 260 max when driving. That should be more then enough. My current alt is 135, but normally at idle I think most alternators produce half, so that 67.5 amps. Yours is most likely are doing less then mine, although you have a drastically smaller setup, I guess because your alt is small, the PC is still impacting it. May be youll be interested in this? http://www.scionlife.com/forums/showthread.php?t=95848

4) Well seeing the PC kills the battery, maybe an auto start feature, via an alarm system? Then have a program like LogMeIn? Thats what I plan to do. Not sure if I am going to use LogMeIn though, I want to be able to control the system with my Pocket PC phone, and I think they have a program for that, just not sure if it works on a desktop. I may just use both programs....

5) I agree.... DVD and even BluRay are useless in the car now a days with HDDs being so cheap. I decided to get a 1 TB drive to put all my DVDs and all media on. I guess the DVD ROM which is hidden can be for people that still use CDs. Just hide yours in a place thats handy if you need it for some reason.



I dont know if you have upgraded to CF3 yet, but it is finally polished enough that its awesome. Since you been gone, we users have found a way to update our Destinator maps to the latest maps for free. Also Vegus has made a cool plugin that gives Destinator live traffic routing. Those two things have made me happy. Also all the skin issues have been fixed. Its amazing how fast people are creating plugins now for CF3. I guess the new design really is faster for Devs.

Hope all goes well with the new construction.