strife

iTrader: (1)

Did you ever get your carpc working?

Spoonie

I wouldn't want Microsoft Windows running anything in my car. Too many lock-ups, freezes, and crashes!

yahu

iTrader: (55)

Not XP, well at least on my installs. All the advice here sounds great. Definitely go with 1GB RAM and an SSD if you can.

JediGillTees

iTrader: (11)

Do you have a Car computer or are you simply making a judgment call on your computer experience.?

JediGillTees

iTrader: (11)

Hello,
Just a little background information.. I actually already have a car computer in the Evo, and I'm also a computer technician as my trade.

I would say I have quite a bit of experience with car computers considering i've done 3 of them.

In terms of the size of the screen, if you research the website you can easily find the dimensions of the unit. Keep in mind that you have to think about the outer plastic edges and depth

The one mistake that I feel you are making is deciding not to go with a SSD Drive. Your hard drive will fail if you decide to go with any sata, or ide drive. The harsh road is too much for the devices not to mention they won't operate well in cold and hot temperatures.

You said they are too expensive but you really only need about 32GB for the operating system and installed software. If you want more for music buy a 64gb jump drive and call it a day.

I personally have great experience with my Xenarc 7102. 7" Screen. It is brighter than the others and shines fine even though sunlight hits it.

Go with Windows XP, for speed and compatibility. Vista will run too slow, and Linux is limited. Also consider buying a wireless keyboard.

Keep in mind if you are short on cash and want to take shortcuts.. you'll end up spending more learning by trial and error if you simply research and it did it right the first time.

Also for power in case you haven't researched it.. check out that mp3car.com and buy the 150 watt one. M2 I think.. that's more than plenty and will auto start and auto shutdown your pc for you.

Here is a picture of my setup. It's in one of the girl pics Good luck..
https://www.evolutionm.net/forums/ev...hotoshoot.html

Spoonie

15 year's worth of Windows/PC experience. My latest Windows nightmare is my Windows Mobile Smart-phone. If the CAR PC is indeed stable it would be a first for any Windows platform. Execpt for Maybe Windows NT 4.0

lancer0220

iTrader: (6)

i run xp in my car for almost 6 months and no problems the only program that freezes is centrafuse because its a hacked version. the trial ran fine and never crashed once for the 30 days that i tested it. remember when its running in the car it serves as a media player its not running high memory programs...

yahu

iTrader: (55)

then you should know damn well that bluescreens, freezes, etc. in Windows, especially XP, are most likely 3rd party driver related, or 3rd party apps interacting with drivers. Keep the install simple, use quality parts with proven drivers and you will be fine. Agreed with the Jedi and stating again --> go SSD!

As far as Mobile, that is a very unfair comparison to desktop windows. NT 4 was a solid commercial platform - good luck using apps that weren't commercial related. Windows 2k was also very solid for commercial and got way better with apps. Windows XP was a solid release for commercial and consumer (it had to be since Windows Me sucked so bad). Unfortunately it got slower as more patches came out, but still performed well. Vista...well, no comment.

Windows Mobile is a completely different group that has ported what they can from "big boy" windows and built whatever else they needed. Very business oriented and a horrible end user experience at times, but does very well in a lot of aspects, especially for the business user. I'm worried where the mobile OS is going in its next iteration, especially with the increasingly tough competition, though.

SupremeX

iTrader: (1)

Well.. that makes sense

Windows is very rarely the problem as most of the time it is 3rd party hardware and software that cause the issues.

I know who I wouldn't hire!

Spoonie

I know that. But whose going to have an OS install without any 3rd party apps installed?

Also, I got out of the PC repair business a long time ago (too many headaches/and not enough money) and got into programming. I still build my own boxes (since 1994). I might attach a pic of my latest build so you guys can drool.

Spoonie

You are correct about the 3rd party stuff. And FWIW my latest home build is very stable running Windows Vista 64. Its just that after time the OS seems to start to decay. And only a fresh install of the OS will cure it. Most problems are 3rd party related but more times than not its an API issue that wasn't ironed out during development that caused the problem. So in a way its still Windows related, sort of :-)

I'll probably get an SSD over the winter when I migrate over to Windows 7.

Windows 2K. Haven't heard that in a while. Win 2K was the last really free MS OS :-). I still have a Win 2k CD!! And you are right about the Millenuim Edition. It was horrible. Vista? No comment :-) Lol!!


They do have their work cut out for them but Windows Mobile still has the most 3rd party apps available and a larger devolper user community. You can code your own windows mobile app using the windows Mobile SDK. I don't think that there are any tools available to the public that allows you to code your own Symbian Apps?

asplodzor

iTrader: (1)

Not to nitpick, but I'd be willing to bet that Palm OS has the most 3rd party apps available.

yahu

iTrader: (55)

And palm is running? A version of Windows Mobile! DOH!

yahu

iTrader: (55)

You are kind of right about the API stuff. A big problem is that MS constantly updates APIs to fix the "lazy approach" that they previously supported. Unfortunately, MS also provides a lot of sample code that utilized the APIs and their previously "lazy approach." I'd say 90% of the 3rd party devs, maybe higher, utilize sample code (hell, a lot of them copy/paste it) and then don't bother updating this appropriately. A lot of it is MS fault, to be sure.

I worked on Millennium Edition. My area rocked, but I apologize in general.

While mobile does have a large dev base, the overall core has to be solid in order for people to be interested enough to do anything with it. As a shareholder I am horrified to think that the next release could be Mobile's "Vista." As a shareholder, I do hope that I'm wrong.

Spoonie

You should be OK then. You might also want to network the thing via (evdo) or purchase a 3rd party Nav application. That way you’ll have navigation as well look into it. I’d imagine by now that there should be a 3rd party app that displays the actual photo-realistic satellite images of the NAV map, like google-maps does on my Smart phone. Way nicer than the Cartoon-like Maps that all current NAV systems use. It’s cool as hell as does real-time traffic as well. Good luck.

Sorry if I sounded like a jerk in the last reply.