My brother’s first car – and his first car pc!
My wonderful brother Peter passed his test a month ago – a good year after he’d finished buying all the bits for his Car PC. Now he has got a car at last, he has got his Car PC installed and working!
If you’re looking a for an easy install what he’s done might be of interest to you. A while back I was sent a Karputer KCU (which I have used myself when testing my setup) which is a unit that combines power control, power supply and an amplifier into one unit that is certified for plugging into your Car’s ISO connector.
Unfortunately it wasn’t the perfect solution for me as I was looking for a higher level of integration but I knew it would be perfect for him, and he’s had it since then along with the other parts of the Car PC he bought over a year ago!
I’m pleased to say with the help of the KCU he managed to get the unit installed by himself and (after I told him where to find ther right information) got RoadRunner and Freedrive setup and he popped round this evening to show me. Here’s the photos…
Pete’s Car – Vauxhall Corsa
There it is! Next to my wonderful focus 
on my drive. It’s not the flashiest car but he’s just 18 and insurance is very very expensive. It’s certainly a *lot* better than my first car!
The Install
It’s a fairly basic install but it’s fully functional. As you can see the screen is mounted where the radio normally would be and it’s removable for security reasons.
The system unit is stored under the seat, and uses a standard Mini-ITX Case:
And the Karputer KCU is fitted into the dashboard. The reset/on switch (It is controlled by ignition, but the button is there in case you want to override it – like a normal stereo) and volume control is mounted under the screen, as you can see with the blue LED attached to it…
And the KCU unit itself is stored under the glovebox:
So well done to my brother pete! I hope you have a lot of fun with it! Next up we’ll have to link them by GPRS so we can see where each other is on the map You think I’m kidding?
August 8th, 2006 at 10:37 am
This looks awesome, the whole PC idea in the car is great, love reading the blog!
November 12th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
Hey Stevie just found your site bud , Thanks for all the info i was in a jam setting a Carputer up in my Supra.
will keep watching you.
December 19th, 2006 at 4:03 am
i am thinking of putting a CarPc into my car.
And i wanted to build one myself.
i had few questions – in all your posts u were using VIA processors, and mini components, can i use regular PC components? like pentiuim 4, or something like that, i know in powerfull machines there will be a question how to power it, but i will go for P4 – 1.4 GHz it is around 120W, so there shouldn’t be a problem)
secondly – what if i will take a laptop and take it apart? is it worth of trying?
thank you.
February 5th, 2007 at 8:22 pm
Hi Dima
Yes you can use anything you want – it doesn’t even need to be PC bits. You’ll probably have seen people have put Mac Mini’s into cars (OK, they are PC bits now).
Especially with Core Duo processers and better it’s possible to have decent performance and low power usage so VIA might not be the way to go in the future!