Thread: Concorde Version 2

man i'm soooo glad you didn't install it under the hood, because the case is not water proof and under the hood is sooo hot that it'll overheat the cpu in no time, by the way whenever you're typing and accidentally delete something before doing anything hit ctrl-z (undo) and it should undo your last action.
the problem with your tool it's stamped right on it, CHINA.

Oh, I wasn't going to mount it under the hood, I was looking at it from a wiring standpoint. It is very crowded.

Yeah, it was a cheap set of tools from Home Depot anyways. I didn't shed any tears when it died

All times in seconds, 4GB RAM, 1.8GHz processor w/ Windows XP SP2 & all drivers installed.

Time To POST 9
Time To Start Menu 35
Time To Shut Down 23
Time To Standby 13
Time To Resume 3

Originally Posted by Punky

that'll be awesome! Right now, i'm using a asrock mobo and it has absolutely zero POST time and i love that so much that i refused to upgrade until theres another board that has this feature.

Update: I knocked 2 seconds off POST time and 5 seconds off Time To Start Menu by adjusting the boot order (Took all but HD out, HD is first). Guessing the 5 seconds is because I had the XP disc still in the drive. Duh.

try disabling ide and sata channels that have nothing plugged into them, bios tried to detect if anything is connected at boot up, it might shave off an extra 1 or 2 seconds.

Digi-Key shipment arrived today. MP3Car.com shipment should be here tomorrow!

Injector I will try those changes tonight and post back the difference.

wow! thorough install & logging here.

i love how you put patience & quality of work over speed & convenience. way to go, take your time and do it right. :beer: i love the location of the PC - good call. i would probably throw a fan or two in there anyway; while it is in the interior of the car, there is no air circulation in there and even though the HVAC controls are just north, they don't send air into that cubby area. LOVE the USB location in the lighter socket. love how you hide the PC with that flap in the console too - completely hidden.

i'm not a fan of the cameras - locations & how you did that i guess. i don't understand the need for a forward-facing camera from your rear view mirror, and compared to everything else you did, the install is rather conspicuous & not exactly clean. the rear camera - well..... let's just say that's not pretty. Functional, yes, but not pretty. can i suggest this camera:
http://cgi.ebay.com/CCD-LICENSE-PLAT...QQcmdZViewItem

i bought this and it is a CCD lens, not CMOS. it's color, and has infra-red ability. it's also in the license plate frame, so it's pretty inconspicuous.

don't understand what the need for the Visteon HD radio was.... but i'll send you a PM with a secret about ebay. don't want to share it publicly.

congrats, looks good though! what else do you need for the install?

Wednesday May 6th:
My Digi-Key shipment arrived today containing what I need to make the nice molex connectors for the power supply. The goal of this is to make a nice finished look, as the back of the VoomPC-2 has.

This will make it easy to connect to the power in the car, and by creating an extra connector I'll easily be able to connect the Thin Client to the automotive power, or take it in and throw it up on the workbench, connecting it to the power supply without opening it up.

So with the Digi-Key products arriving today I got busy making the custom connections. I need to make:

• Thin Client External Connetor
• Connection from distribution to Thin Client
• Connection from desktop PSU to Thin Client

Following this guide and vladcarpc's photos I started making my custom connections. (I apologize for the photo quality, I used the camera on my phone as I did not have access to the Canon EOS)

I started by creating the jumper connections for the ATX plug to fool the PSU into believing it is connected to a motherboard. I tried using some 18AWG from the PSU wire I hacked off. While I could make it fit, it was not a nice quick easy secure plug. I should have thought this part out in advance and ordered the appropriate connections from Digi-Key so that I could create a clean quick disconnect. For now, I'll use paper clips, they fit just fine and secure.

Next I moved on to creating the connection for the 12V line from a spare fan connector. Using the previously ordered molex pin remover I popped the bad boys out, stripped off the end, slid it into the female pin connector, and "crimped" it down. I say "crimped" because I didn't have the official tool to crimp these ends down so I'm just using needle nose pliers. Rough look of the idea.

It was at this point I decided it'd be best if the ends had some heatshrink on 'em to prevent them from coming loose during regular use. I ran off to the local Lowe's (closest hardware store). The smallest heatshrink they had was 1/8". I picked it up for $1.98.

I cut a tube into about 1" lengths (comes in 4" cuts) and initially the fit looks good.

While at Lowe's I also found some insulated female disconnect pieces. I found red and blue, but I wanted a third color, so that I can have positive, negative, and ignition easily visible. The website shows yellow ones, so I'll need to go back and look again, else shop around. 12pack was $1.98/pack.

When I get home tonight I'll break out the heat gun and shrink that tubing around the wire. Also, I'll take some better photos, but I was just too excited to get started on the next parts to let this sit any longer!

Originally Posted by ABTsportsline

wow! thorough install & logging here.

Ha, thanks! I hate the worklogs that just have 4 pictures and specs. I wanted something that I could look back later and say, "OH YEAH! I remember cutting that stupid plastic for an hour in the car trying to make it fit just perfect"

i love the location of the PC - good call. i would probably throw a fan or two in there anyway; while it is in the interior of the car, there is no air circulation in there and even though the HVAC controls are just north, they don't send air into that cubby area.

I'm thinking on the sides of the console area there would be room to run a fan. I'd put an intake on the passenger side and an exhaust on the driver. I figure intake on the passenger side because while I do have people ride with me quite often, I don't ALWAYS have a passenger, so that side stays pretty clean compared to the driver side. I'd still need some filters and an easy way to access the filters and clean them without having to do too much work.

LOVE the USB location in the lighter socket. love how you hide the PC with that flap in the console too - completely hidden.

I'm torn on the USB location - I have a rather large Targus Notebook "Dock" that connects via USB. It gives something crazy like 8 USB ports, parallel, audio, VGA, PS/2, etc... I was thinking I could mount this in the glovebox and run the cables to the carputer quite easily.

And in place of the cig lighter I could put a small kill switch or at least something that I could toggle to prevent the computer from powering on when it's still -20F or 120F.

i'm not a fan of the cameras - locations & how you did that i guess. i don't understand the need for a forward-facing camera from your rear view mirror, and compared to everything else you did, the install is rather conspicuous & not exactly clean.

These aren't installed, I just placed them to get an idea of what it would look like from the outside. I would tuck the wires and mount 'em a little bitter. I literally just set them in place.

The thought behind the cameras is I would use the Capture! software to record about an hour of video. This would allow me, in the event of an accident to say, "No see, you pulled out in front of me". I had an accident 4 years ago and could not prove that the jerk pulled out in front of me and I was found to be at fault.

The rear camera would be more of a backup camera/just in case. I got pulled over last night, the officer never pegged me but he did claim he had been following me for several minutes. It'd just be one of those, "Oh yeah I see, he pulled out from that church parking lot" kinda scenarios.

I LOVE the license plate camera, but I wouldn't know how to connect it to the CarPC, I think the Lilli would have a way to use that as a 2nd input for when I want to use reverse, but otherwise like I said, wouldn't know if I could connect to to the Carputer.

The reason I'm using the bulky webcams is because I already have them. Nothing to purchase.

The front one you can't see easily from outside, and I'm thinking if I can take apart the front one I could easily hide it better.

don't understand what the need for the Visteon HD radio was....

My goal would be to have the headunit gone and use the VHD as the tuner.

congrats, looks good though! what else do you need for the install?

- 4AWG From Battery & 8AWG From Distribution
- LCD (Waiting on this as I might be able to score one for FREE!)
- 125AMP Fuse placed about a foot from battery.
- Heatshrink Labels to mark off the wires
- Good weather after everything is here to install!

Thanks for the feedback and motivation ABT, I do need to rethink the cameras as I would love a more integrated/hidden look to them.