Car PC

[BMac1203]

Emphasis added. I don't think shielding will help.

 

Agreed, it must be right at either end that's the problem.

 

Would it be possible to somehow use a different connector that could isolate the wires further apart from eachother? I know that this will be difficult due to the VGA having so many wires.

[BMac1203]

So...here's two more bezels....A new one for me (making my "old" one available for sale ) and the Red one that you saw before, for a VERY patient user here

 

The bezel below looks much better in person. Unfortunately my GF is away right now, and she has the good digital camera, mine is only 2mp.

 

I put the vents in for pictures (the right vent missing the silver tab on center), and laid my spare screen in for pictures as well (which is what the pepsi bottle in some pics is for, to push against the screen to keep it in place)

 

 

 

 

 

And now to my homemade Apartment paint booth....You can see that it's pure custom. (Not pictured: Full apartment venting system - OPEN WINDOWS, and Super Expensive Paint Cure Baking System - WINDOW SILL IN SUNLIGHT)

 

Story behind painting in a small enclosed room, my complex's Grounds Manager came to me one day while I was outside and said that I could not paint outside anymore. The funny part, is that Ive been doing this for over 8 months now, and I had a HUGE piece of cardboard on the grass, I did not get ONE DROP of overspray on the grass. So, I've resorted to my own in-home paint booth.

 

 

 

 

This bezel is for a user here, hopefully he'll like it and you'll see it in his car soon!

[BMac1203]

^Nice bezel, and paint booth!

 

Thanks! Hopefully Ill have the new one in my car soon (maybe tomorrow), and pics of the one in the paint booth as well.

 

::whispers:: Original bezel may be for sale, stay posted ::whispers::

[BMac1203]

Well the pins in a VGA connector are much closer together than the ones in the white connector. Also, my Xenarc screen only uses 7 of the 15 pins.

 

That's weird. One would think that theoretically, spreading the wires in the connector would be better, not worse. Interference is from close proximity, not the opposite.

 

How close are some of the VGA wires from the USB or power wires?

 

Would you be willing to disassemble / desolder these connectors and test out each wire 1 by 1 to find the affected wire? That may be your last resort, but we can continue wracking our brains until we reach that point.

[NSFW]

I don't think the problem is related to proximity either, I'm guessing it's radio wave reflections off of the connections at each end of the wire that runs between the VGA connector and the white block. High-frequency (radio-frequency) connections are finicky that way.

[BMac1203]

I don't think the problem is related to proximity either, I'm guessing it's radio wave reflections off of the connections at each end of the wire that runs between the VGA connector and the white block. High-frequency (radio-frequency) connections are finicky that way.

 

That's true. I hate wires...hah. Honestly never thought Id experience these problems in reality. Ive learned a lot about these things, and wavelengths and whatnot, but never experienced them.

 

Couldnt this be caused by the wires not being the same exact length as well?

 

I know that network cables can have issues if the wiring is off as well.

[NSFW]

I have to say I just barely understand this stuff, so I'm not fully confident here, but anyway...

 

Ghosting isn't an interference problem, so much as a signal degradation problem. So I don't think any amount of shielding is going to help. If you are still having interference problems (snow/glitching/flicker/etc under specific conditions) then I'd expect better shielding to help, but IIRC the main problem now is ghosting - am I right?

 

It might be interesting to try running at lower or higher resolutions, using a regular monitor rather than the CarPC panel. If the ghosting gets worse at higher resolutions, I think that would also suggest signal degradation (as opposed to interference from outside) as the culprit.

 

It would be interesting to try using your CarPC panel + short cable with a regular PC. That way you could hold the short cable well away from the (encased) motherboard, which should minimize interference issues... then see if the problem persists. I suspect it will, because like I said I don't think this is an interference problem.

 

I don't know if unequal-length cables would matter or not. I suspect not, though.

[NSFW]

Totally unrelated question.... first, some background:

 

I want to put an LCD in my dash, a computer in my car, and get rid of the stock stereo. I have one of those MP3 head units coming from that eBay seller, and I'm going to hack on my old head unit and see if I can make room for an LCD panel and keep the climate controls.

 

So then I'll have the PC as the only source of audio. I still want a nice big volume knob in the dash, though.

 

I could use a preamp-type-thing with a remote volume knob, like a JL Cleansweep or RF360. But I'd rather skip that, and just run the computer's audio outputs right into a regular amp. So what I want is a volume knob which would adjust the computer's audio output level - but ideally, without any audio signals going to the knob. I want a USB volume knob, that just tells the computer how loud it should be.

 

The question:

 

Does anything like that exist on the market?

 

 

Thanks!

[NSFW]

I must have misread something earlier, I thought the interference had been solved and ghosting was the main problem now, looks like I had it backward.

[BMac1203]

I must have misread something earlier, I thought the interference had been solved and ghosting was the main problem now, looks like I had it backward.

 

Agreed. I think Ive been confused this entire time. I had originally thought that we were talking about ghosting, which I also originally said couldn't be due to shielding, but then we began talking about interference.

 

Lol then I thought that someone had said that it was due to interference, so we went from there.

 

Ghosting is deff. a monitor or signal issue (could also be due to signal loss through solder joints, etc.). How long is your VGA cable?

 

Interference would most likely be shielding issues, or waveform/signal issues if it really gets to that technical.

[BMac1203]

Im sorry Sebb.

 

Haha, no prob on the spraybooth idea. Works great for indoors (but open windows are needed)

 

Hopefully we can get this figured out for ya.

[f1anatic]

Seb...maybe you're running the wires next to something which produces strong EMF interference. I do not know...but obviously it seems like a solitary case. Reroute rather than wrap. And change the damn wire altogether - unless you have it under the carpet thus making diagnostics a priority over replacement.

[NSFW]

If you run a standard VGA cable end-to-end, how is the picture?

 

Can you adjust your mounting plans to make rooms for a big ol' VGA connector hanging off the motherboard?

[turbo427]

If i understand the thread you have a custom cable in the car and you have problems but it ok hooked to factory cable. At the end of factory cable some time at both end is a a magnet you wrap the wire around it going throw the center then around the outside 2 wraps is plenty, This helps with EMF in the line.

[Jerboa113]

nice work bmac! I havent been reading can ya summarize what you're doing there? from the post it sounds like you're selling those custom jobs (which look awesome) what kinda price are you looking at, and what screen are you using for them?

 

weird that your complex manager has no problem fumes in an enclosed area that might can cause people to DIE.. but paint fumes outside are soooo bad.. I hate apartments.. I'm glad I'm moving out of mine.. just last night someone across the hall threw a party that lasted until 4am. they throw beer bottles down the stairs and have had the cops called on them twice in a month.

[andrew.anderson]

Sebberry,

 

I just wanted to say good luck wiht the Video signal fix. I have a subscription to this thread and have been monitoring your dilema.

Sounds like it sucks.

[andrew.anderson]

Is that pictue you posted earlier a picture of the VGA connector you plug the monitor into? I don't know what else it could be but I am baffled why you don't just get soem thin sheet metal and built something to attach it to?

[turbo427]

Nothing is in the car right now, this is all on my workbench (er.. desk)

 

When using a normal video cable (with no ferrites on the ends) it works fine. When using my little custom hookup job, I get the problem.

 

If I understand correctly you have a regular VGA cable with no ferrites magenite on ether end I thought all VGA cables had them. VGA over long distance can be a problem did over head projector once had to use a CAT conversion, explain again what the screen looks like. Looking at connection you can get interferance from exposed connection.

[turbo427]

my bad went back and re read your earlier post on video output. The other thing check is Frequence, monitors run @ 60htz not sure about your display, but I quess that doesn't make sense ether cause it work with VGA cable, the only other possible problem noise in the ground, have you ever pluged mp3 player or some to a car radio and heard the static with video you can't hear it but its still there because your wire ends don't look shield they could be picking up ground noise, when its in the car see if the video is effected by rpm. I'll be watch this allways wanted to do one of these myself just never had the extra cash.

[f1anatic]

I have to say I was getting a lot of interference at some point early on...and then I proceeded more scientifically: I saw whatever resolution the monitor was working on (actually 1024 x 878 ?) had a different refresh rate than the Windows output. So I went into the display settings and matched the frequency to that of the monitor.

 

In my case I was getting some fine horizontal lines.

 

Nowadays, the monitor will just refresh itself every now and then ...and lose the illumination settings (like brightness)...It is not something done on a regular basis...and so far I put up with it.

[metalac]

Alright, I give up on this stupid thing...

 

Just got the new hard drive today, installed it and the carputer keeps rebooting and making a ticking noise from the little speaker.. even reboots when sitting in the BIOS screen.. Swapped out the RAM, still did it.

 

Damnit, all the time and money I have put into this project and now this happens.

 

EDIT: Yes, it was rebooting before I changed the drive... I figured it was just due to the faulty drive I had connected.

 

What sort of temperatures do you see?

[turbo427]

Try going into bios, this usally needs to set to boot other or boot CF, the bios right now is still looking for IDE drive so it keeps rebooting some bios manufactures have stop screen warning unable to find drive. Hope this helps

[BMac1203]

Congrats! Just got my system back into my car this past weekend, but now my screen isn't working. Hah, there's ALWAYS something to fix!!

 

Still waiting on someone to create a way to interface with the iPod through a front-end, so that I don't have to transfer 20 gigs of music onto the laptop HD (most of which wouldn't play in CF or RR due to being legally purchased iTunes songs with DRM protections).

 

But best of luck to you, keep us updated!

[Jerboa113]

 

Still waiting on someone to create a way to interface with the iPod through a front-end, so that I don't have to transfer 20 gigs of music onto the laptop HD (most of which wouldn't play in CF or RR due to being legally purchased iTunes songs with DRM protections).

 

 

on that note, it MAY be possible to make some sort of simple script, if you know how the winamp playlists work, or use some sort of automated media library scanner thing for whatever media player you use. You can enable the ipod as a harddrive, inside that there is a hidden directory that has numbered directories inside THAT.. and inside those are your actual mp3 files ith the original names. The ipod works basically by (as my understanding) using an xml file to reference these. As to what the numbers mean I dont know..

 

but.. it may be easier to do that than you think. If you have some batch scripting or light programming knowledge you might be able to do that.

 

I dont know how in windows, but in linux you can probablly look in /proc for a newly connected device (usb something? I dont REALLY Know that well in linux either) and when its detected taht the ipod has been connected, runt he script that syncs your winamp library, and run the music off the ipod and never have to copy the music to your carputers harddrive.

 

damnit! dont drag me back into this hobby!! its too expensive and addictive!

[BMac1203]

Hah.

 

Well honestly, I ALMOST got out of this said hobby until JUST recently when I got everything back in the car and working again.

 

Im on my 2nd bezel, and this one looks DARN near OEM, if not better. Computer starts up quick, Navigation is on the dime (no lag), screen comes on with car, etc. (Obviously nothing new for you guys, but finally mine works as it should)

 

So, Ive pulled myself back into this, might as well drag you down with me!