I just finished installing a PC in my car this past weekend, and I am very pleased with the results. It has been one of the more satisfying projects I've ever decided to take on by myself. It is a lot of work, and if anyone else decides to try it I recommend going over to www.mp3car.com to gather all the info you will need...

Here's my baby:


Here's my finished dash:


Testing software on my desk:


Somewhat finished trunk:


My homemade wiring diagram:


Various install shots:






Questions, Comments?

 

Whoa, thats wicked. Do you have any pics of it running navi and the other stuff? How much did it cost?

 

Yeah I'll upload some more pics later tonight. I've spent about $1500 so far, and let me tell you it gets addicting. There's always more stuff you can add. It can be done pretty easily for less than $1000 if you've got the right stuff lying around. You can do it for even less if you use an old computer youve got and an inverter. I went the brand new route though with a dc-dc power supply with a built in startup/shutdown controller.

But for $1500, which is comparable to a Pioneer/Kenwood/Eclipse navi price, you get much more. 80GB of music and video, and anything else you could think of to run off of a computer. I can data log with my X-Cal2 now without having to lug around a laptop. I love it. Anyways, more pics to come later tonight.

 

Yeah man. I wanna do this when I get a car. I have a background in building computers and other electronic crap so it should be fun.

 

Looks like we are using the same skin.

 

OK, here are some more pics showing the various functions of the "skin" I am using. The skin is called MC2.0, and it runs off of a program called Roadrunner.

Audio Playlist:


Visualization:


Video Main Screen:


Video Fullscreen:


Navigation (iGuidance version 2.1.3):


And a little Nintendo for my passengers:

 

Nice job, Chris! [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/thumb.gif[/img]

How is all this controlled? (touch screen, wireless keyboard/mouse, game controller)

And how's the screen's visibility in the daylight?

 

It's all controlled by a touchscreen, although I do have a usb game controller for my passengers to play games with.

Visibility can be bad on a bright sunny day. Its fine on a partly cloudy day though. I think the pros outweigh the cons, and I've got the main button controls pretty well memorized now, so I just put my entire music collection on shuffle and skip any song I don't want to listen to.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(WarningSLO @ April 25, 2006, 12:59 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
It's all controlled by a touchscreen, although I do have a usb game controller for my passengers to play games with.

Visibility can be bad on a bright sunny day. Its fine on a partly cloudy day though. I think the pros outweigh the cons, and I've got the main button controls pretty well memorized now, so I just put my entire music collection on shuffle and skip any song I don't want to listen to.
[/b][/quote]
Very nice.

btw- we're both part of the 'Teri Club'! [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/04.gif[/img]

 

Is everything stored on the hard drive or is there a way to put in a cd/dvd?

 

The computer is mounted to the back of the rear passenger side seat, and when it folds down, the cd/dvd slot is reachable, though I don't see myself using it too often. Everything is on the hard drive.

 

This is really sweet....I'm an EE major at Univ. of Michigan, I'd love to do something like this. Can you send me any additional information?

 

Check out mp3car.com

It is such a custom job kind of thing that it takes a lot of research. Go to the FAQ subforum there and read as much as you can.

<span style="color:#3333FF">***GO HERE***</span>

 

I have already started to put together all the pices I need for this project...but I'm going with a Mac Mini instead.

I do have a question as to which screen you used and what dash kit did you use to mount it. The one you have is CLEAN looking...

 

Wow, great work. I like the custom look of the mustang "skin" theme. Its too back they don't have a folding screen option where you could load stuff from a CD \ DVD without crawling in the trunk.