Carputer for Punto

Hi Fiat-ians,

I have a Punto Active : and a old laptop . The lappy has P4 Mobile processor with 1GB RAM and NVIDIA graphics card. I am not using this lappy much. So, I am planning to use it as Punto's computer. I do not have car audio yet.:sadblue Listening to music would be the primary use of the car computer. Any advices or help is welcomed.

Cheers,
Soundar

 

If you are able to achieve this, let me know as well!! Would love to do something like that

 

My questions :

How do you intend to keep the laptop powered
If you manage to keep it powered how to you intend to mount it and where do you intend to mount it .
Even if you use a auxillary screen and place the laptop somewhere else how do you intend to navigate on the screen (You'd need to implement touch screen )
And how to you intend to protect the laptop from car dust and the shocks

 

Hey,

even i was planning about a carputer for my punto till things got complicated and i lost my cool

Building a carputer takes a lot of patience mate...
I've seen a honda civic with a carputer and boy it rocks, wifi, gps, bluetooth unlimited raw HQ music, HD movies, OBD on the go!

Do refer to this thread on team-bhp for more info
http://www.team-
bhp.com/forum/diy-do-
yourself/63343-hondaputer-
carpc-my-anhc.html

Happy ICEing!

Anshul

 

MY requirement from the carputer is to play music and serve as a GPS receiver. I am not touching the OBDII for now. I am planning to pack it under the passenger seat. I have came across a touch screen monitor, Liliput, which cost around 15K. For this money, I would get my punto ICEd with a decent music system. So I am looking for an alternative. I am planning to draw power from the power socket. Is it okay.

I am planning to start working on this from January. I don't know where to start from. From other sites I have gathered some information, which will be helpful during the course.

My kid's name is Anshu

 

Soundar if you are indeed planning on doing this you'd have to invest in a SSD hard drive .. our usual HDD's will crash if they are constanly under shock due to our Indian road conditions.Since its a P4 i don't know if your motherboard will be able to take in a SSD.Or if you are fine with less space then you can install linux on a USB drive, boot from it and not use the HDD.

 

Hi Soundar,
check here for my carputer build.
As others have pointed out, you need to use a touch screen for input/output and need to manually start & shutdown the pc.[no auto start or shut down]. It can be powered from the car battery through a adapter + charger.

--Rajeev

 

Thanks for your suggestions. I was not able to progress even a step toward carputer direction for a long time. Reason is hectic job and really busy weekends. I even haven't visited TFI, which I as addicted like any thing. I think I will become free in couple of weeks. So I am planning to resume.

1) As suggested by many (including atulalvenkar) I am planning to skip HDD. Instead, I will use a pen drive (16 GB). My laptop has USB 1.1 and not USB 2. I know it will be slow accessing data from pendrive. I need experts suggestion on this. Will it affect the performance? I used to watch movies from external HDD via same USB port without any problems.

2) As I do not have ICE in my car, suggest me some decent Amp (cheap and VFM one, as I am on tight budget) which has AUX in. Any decent speakers. Does Punto Active comes with wiring for speakers?

3) Touch screen monitors are too costly. Really costly. I am not sure about the reliability of them as well. I am also eying on a (may be) better alternative. Any guesses?

4) I am planning to power the laptop using car laptop charger. I am also having a plan to us a switch near the steering wheel to start and shutdown the laptop. As I have punto active, can I get the menu buttons for emotion varriant and modify it to use as a power button?

@rajeev_pillai: Sir, I am closely following your thread. How is your set up coming up? Please post some update as I am eager to see.

 

Sounder,
For point 1, ur laptop should support booting from USB drive.
2. How about using home PC speakers (2.1 or more) as an alternative? you can directly connect it to the lappy. (I had used my Creative 2.1 with my Transcend player).
3. T.S monitors are too costly and unfortunately, there is no other alternatives with minimum distraction.
4. I think you can use it. but no idea about its cost

rajeev

 

Alternative I am thinking is using a android pad (Got interested from Linea HUD thread). Cheap once cost same as 7" touchscreen. Yet the reliability and the quality is to be tested.