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In vehicle pc build - Dont exactly know where to put this -

WickedStarfish

Budget (including currency): max of $4000 aud for everything

Country: Australia

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: music, chip tuning and vehicle monitoring mainly

 

So my father is a car guy so he currently is doing a project car (rambler hornet with a 600+hp engine) and he wanted me to try and design a computer in the car to monitor and edit the ecu on the go, so i was thinking of building the system inside of the dash parallel to the air con setup so i could send some of that cold air over the pc, so the computer will need 3 or 4 usb ports (easily on the motherboard), one for the obd port, one to use a tablet as a monitor, a female usb port in the dash and a port for mouse and keyboard

now the computer will be running a 2din touchscreen monitor for inside of the dash to run music and system monitoring and a second monitor for various other things that will be placed where he would like it. 

im probably going to go a 10th gen i5 10400, i was going to go a amd 3400G but am struggling to find a motherboard that supports it (mainly because of the iGPU). this motherboard will need to be a micro one that supports both hdmi out, 3-4 usb ports and a m.2 ssd / nvme. and would need to be able to survive a little bit of moisture, as due to how cold a cars aircon gets there may become a tiny bit of condensation

 

so the thing im mainly needing input on is

i would like to set it up to run off of the battery and not through an inverter and then the battery and im wondering if that is at all possible, and i would also like to set it up so it turns on when the ignition switch is on, so it turns on with the car.

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Maybe you could fit a NUC into it instead of building from scratch?

QUOTE ME IN A REPLY SO I CAN SEE THE NOTIFICATION!

When there is no danger of failure there is no pleasure in success.

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I'm sure you've got it figured out, but if not: it doesn't seem to me that what your dad needs to do is terribly heavy? Wouldn't something like a Raspberry Pi, with its 4 USB ports and low power usage be suitable? 

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1 minute ago, Samfisher said:

Maybe you could fit a NUC into it instead of building from scratch?

I didnt actually think of that, that may be an easier way to go

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1 minute ago, Gingercan said:

I'm sure you've got it figured out, but if not: it doesn't seem to me that what your dad needs to do is terribly heavy? Wouldn't something like a Raspberry Pi, with its 4 USB ports and low power usage be suitable? 

i did think about a rasberry pi but im not sure that it would be powerful enough as i did need to run windows on it due to the programs that will be used

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3 minutes ago, WickedStarfish said:

i did think about a rasberry pi but im not sure that it would be powerful enough as i did need to run windows on it due to the programs that will be used

Gotcha. Then a NUC might be your best bet. I'd just be worried about moisture at that point, but if it's just behind the dash (and thus still in the cabin), you might be fine.

That said, a Pi is capable of running Windows 10, so if the programs are light and you're able to optimize a bit, it might still work out.

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1 minute ago, Gingercan said:

Gotcha. Then a NUC might be your best bet. I'd just be worried about moisture at that point, but if it's just behind the dash (and thus still in the cabin), you might be fine.

yeah, the only moisture would be if i splice into the aircon as they can get quite cold

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I'd go with the NUC idea for sure. It's small enough that it should fit behind the dash.

How do you plan to interact with it through a touchscreen? Most ECUs like a laptop. It'd be such a PITA to use something that small in that form factor.

5 minutes ago, lexusgamer05 said:

Both of those processors are overkill, an Athlon 3000G would be fine. As for the motherboard, any new stock should work fine

Size. Even mITX is a bit big.

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Budget Rig 1 - Sold For $750 Profit

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CPU: Intel i5 7600k Cooler: CryOrig H7 Motherboard: MSI Z270 M5

RAM: Crucial LPX 16GB DDR4 Storage: Intel S3510 800GB GPU: Nvidia GTX 980

PSU: Corsair CX650M Case: EVGA DG73

Monitor: LG 29WK500 Mouse: G.Skill MX780 Keyboard: G.Skill KM780 Cherry MX Red

 

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CPU: Intel i5 4690k Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: MSI Z97i AC ITX

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13 minutes ago, dizmo said:

I'd go with the NUC idea for sure. It's small enough that it should fit behind the dash.

How do you plan to interact with it through a touchscreen? Most ECUs like a laptop. It'd be such a PITA to use something that small in that form factor.

I did manage to set it up with a small samsung tablet that i had laying around to my desktop though a usb cable which gives me the usability of a touch screen but also the option to use a mouse and keyboard, the main screen i wanted as a touchscreen to act as both a stereo and to show what the car is doing and to fit inside of a 2 din slot

the second screen i will setup as either a 10-12" tablet (or maybe just a cable that sends video to a laptop or set it up so that the laptop auto connects when near) and will be used for the modification of the ecu

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42 minutes ago, WickedStarfish said:

cold air over the pc

i recommend against cooling your computer this way

 

my car's radio died because of condensation

-sigh- feeling like I'm being too negative lately

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42 minutes ago, WickedStarfish said:

Budget (including currency): max of $4000 aud for everything

Country: Australia

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: music, chip tuning and vehicle monitoring mainly

 

So my father is a car guy so he currently is doing a project car (rambler hornet with a 600+hp engine) and he wanted me to try and design a computer in the car to monitor and edit the ecu on the go, so i was thinking of building the system inside of the dash parallel to the air con setup so i could send some of that cold air over the pc, so the computer will need 3 or 4 usb ports (easily on the motherboard), one for the obd port, one to use a tablet as a monitor, a female usb port in the dash and a port for mouse and keyboard

now the computer will be running a 2din touchscreen monitor for inside of the dash to run music and system monitoring and a second monitor for various other things that will be placed where he would like it. 

im probably going to go a 10th gen i5 10400, i was going to go a amd 3400G but am struggling to find a motherboard that supports it (mainly because of the iGPU). this motherboard will need to be a micro one that supports both hdmi out, 3-4 usb ports and a m.2 ssd / nvme. and would need to be able to survive a little bit of moisture, as due to how cold a cars aircon gets there may become a tiny bit of condensation

 

so the thing im mainly needing input on is

i would like to set it up to run off of the battery and not through an inverter and then the battery and im wondering if that is at all possible, and i would also like to set it up so it turns on when the ignition switch is on, so it turns on with the car.

There are ready made Android headunits that you can fit in a car. They have lots of programs and you can connect them to OBDII and TPMS etc etc. 

 

These days you don't need a PC, some years ago that android headunits was not a thing you could consider installing a PC in the car now there is no need, android can do everything

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6 minutes ago, lexusgamer05 said:

 

 

Hmmm and what was his next sentence?

Quote

this motherboard will need to be a micro one

 

CPU: Ryzen 9 5900 Cooler: EVGA CLC280 Motherboard: Gigabyte B550i Pro AX RAM: Kingston Hyper X 32GB 3200mhz

Storage: WD 750 SE 500GB, WD 730 SE 1TB GPU: EVGA RTX 3070 Ti PSU: Corsair SF750 Case: Streacom DA2

Monitor: LG 27GL83B Mouse: Razer Basilisk V2 Keyboard: G.Skill KM780 Cherry MX Red Speakers: Mackie CR5BT

 

MiniPC - Sold for $100 Profit

Spoiler

CPU: Intel i3 4160 Cooler: Integrated Motherboard: Integrated

RAM: G.Skill RipJaws 16GB DDR3 Storage: Transcend MSA370 128GB GPU: Intel 4400 Graphics

PSU: Integrated Case: Shuttle XPC Slim

Monitor: LG 29WK500 Mouse: G.Skill MX780 Keyboard: G.Skill KM780 Cherry MX Red

 

Budget Rig 1 - Sold For $750 Profit

Spoiler

CPU: Intel i5 7600k Cooler: CryOrig H7 Motherboard: MSI Z270 M5

RAM: Crucial LPX 16GB DDR4 Storage: Intel S3510 800GB GPU: Nvidia GTX 980

PSU: Corsair CX650M Case: EVGA DG73

Monitor: LG 29WK500 Mouse: G.Skill MX780 Keyboard: G.Skill KM780 Cherry MX Red

 

OG Gaming Rig - Gone

Spoiler

 

CPU: Intel i5 4690k Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: MSI Z97i AC ITX

RAM: Crucial Ballistix 16GB DDR3 Storage: Kingston Fury 240GB GPU: Asus Strix GTX 970

PSU: Thermaltake TR2 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Evolv ITX

Monitor: Dell P2214H x2 Mouse: Logitech MX Master Keyboard: G.Skill KM780 Cherry MX Red

 

 

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58 minutes ago, WickedStarfish said:

i did think about a rasberry pi but im not sure that it would be powerful enough as i did need to run windows on it due to the programs that will be used

If you like Android Auto, you could look up OpenAuto on a Raspberry Pi. It just recently got some support for OBD.

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You can buy motherboards that have cpu soldered to them https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?N=100007623 4814 50001944 50001315 50001312 50001521 50001655

There's also some newer boards with amd laptop cpus made: 

 

 

 

You could also buy the 200ge  or 3000g processors, even those should still have quite a lot of power... and they'll work on older a320 boards.. the 200ge could work even with a passive cooler as it's 35w tdp (see for example arctic cooling alpine especially if you lower the clocks/voltage further (but may need a b350/b450 board for downclocking). 

200ge can be bought for around 40-60$ on ebay/aliexpress.

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