I have a 3 year old, mid range toshiba Laptop laying around. Would this work? or do you need the stronger cpu power of a desktop?

 

Thinking about it I have a Dell inspirion with DirectMedia That allows me to access all my media with out fulling booting up the laptop... The laptop is usually in my truck with me any ways.....hmmm throw in a touch screen .....

 

Main thing you have to worry about is powering the computer. I've got a 160w M2-ATX DC-DC power supply ($80). You hook it into your ignition wire, and it controls the power button on your motherboard (Turn car on, power computer on, turn car off, power computer off, wait 45 seconds, turn power off) You don't want to have too powerful of a computer in your car, it's just overkill. My last system was an AMD 750 Mhz 128mb Ram system running windows 2000, worked perfect and was pretty fast for an old PC. As far as laptops, I've seen them work, but you don't have an intelligent power supply on the market for them, you you'd have to manually turn it on and off everytime...

 

LoL, sorry, just seen your post. I gutted the case, and I'll make something to fit under my back seat...

 

So how does the hard drive like all the vibrations from the truck? I would think you would need to get some isolation bushing on those things or they would eat themselves pretty fast.

 

I use mounts like these, plus I use a laptop hard drive, they're made to handle vibrations better...

 

Before I did anymore work on the bezel, I wanted to see if this bad boy was going to fit, without me have to cut the supports on the dash!!! To my surprise, IT DID!!! Yes, now I can go to town on this thing, lot of sanding, re shaping, sanding, re shaping, sanding smoothing, painting, nope don't like it, sanding shaping... etc.. I HATE THIS PART!!! But here's some pics of it fitting in the dash:







Plastic wrap is just there to prevent scratches until I get the bezel finished... More pics in a couple days!

 

niice!! keep it going your getting closer!!

 

The screen just looks huge to me.. I think I went to big, but hey, it fits, and I think I'll be happy I went with that size once I get done...

 

ridiculous!

I like it!