Team-BHP - View Single Post - Car PC setup, install and some fabrication

ajitkommini · 18th October 2006, 13:35

Hi Ankur,

Many people have installed PCs in their cars successfully - this was more common in the pre-iPOD days when inexpensive portable MP3 players were not so common. Couple of things that spring to mind are

1. Vibration issues: Hard disk drives are pretty sensitive devices and not very resilient to vibration and shock. Make sure that you install some sort of damping or shock absorbent material to take care of this

2. Cooling: If you plan to use a standard desktop type PC it can get pretty hot. If you install it in a closed space you'll definitely run into problems with overheating. Make sure there is enough space around critical components such as processor, power supply, HDD etc. You could install additional fans it runs too hot.

3. Power supply: Do you plan to use the car battery to run this? If it's a desktop it could consume quite a bit of power. A laptop would run more efficiently though. Plus it would be more resistant to shock and heat issues as well

Good luck and let us know how it goes!

18th October 2006, 13:35	#4 (permalink)
ajitkommini BHPian Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Bangalore Posts: 275	Hi Ankur, Many people have installed PCs in their cars successfully - this was more common in the pre-iPOD days when inexpensive portable MP3 players were not so common. Couple of things that spring to mind are 1. Vibration issues: Hard disk drives are pretty sensitive devices and not very resilient to vibration and shock. Make sure that you install some sort of damping or shock absorbent material to take care of this 2. Cooling: If you plan to use a standard desktop type PC it can get pretty hot. If you install it in a closed space you'll definitely run into problems with overheating. Make sure there is enough space around critical components such as processor, power supply, HDD etc. You could install additional fans it runs too hot. 3. Power supply: Do you plan to use the car battery to run this? If it's a desktop it could consume quite a bit of power. A laptop would run more efficiently though. Plus it would be more resistant to shock and heat issues as well Good luck and let us know how it goes!