Oh, gotcha, an Asus Notebook/Minibook of somesort.

Well, I've got about 1.5din worth of space under the parcel shelf there. And the power-smarts you talk about are in that M2-ATX style DC-DC power supply, which does all the overvoltage and undervoltage protection, and the timed start and shutdown. Power Coditioning and timed power events is not the kind of thing I could easily retrofit to a notebook. (But then we often joke that Notebooks on Desks are our official Distributed UPS solution at work......during brownouts all the desktops shutdown while we all keep on going on localised batteries).

It's a good question though, and one I'm not easily able to defend. I'm kinda keen on the latest tech stuff to play with, while trying to keep the cost down, and making it fit into OEM spaces so it is reliable and looks professional. I think I'd struggle with a notebook. Plus I'm carrying a surplus screen and keyboard that won't get used. Kinda like launching a Space Shuttle with all those heavy wings that only get used on the way back down....

That Fujistu Minibook I used for the RGB 15.7kHz interlaced proof of concept tempted me - it's one of the smallest Notebooks I've seen, and I was actually pretty impressed with it's performance. I'll take a few pics of it to show you why if you like.


Lukeyson

From experience there's not much room behind the tissue box tray for anything more than a few cables.

See if you can find a USB external NOTEBOOK DVD drive, they're all heavily cut down in size. tray loading.

These are generally found in the ultra small notebooks, to save space/weight/power, but still there if you want to.

Also they're commonly found in rack mount servers (where space is a priority). IBM does this a lot.

Yep. We have some surplus drives as a result of swapping shipping RO drives with RW Burners from Servers or Notebooks.

So by NOTEBOOK drive, do you mean something else than the type of drive that fits into this USB converter/carrier, or is it the same thing?

Link again: http://store.mo-co-so.com/index.php?mai ... ucts_id=70.


Lukeyson

OK, some more info.

That drive carrier is "5.25" x 5.25" by 0.6"" or in rest-of-the-world measurements, about 13.3cm x 1.5cm. A quick measure on the back of my busted tissue-box tray shows that best-case it might protude about 1cm out the back of the unit, and that at 1.5cm high I could cut a hole just big enoughto miss the biggest of the cross-braces and the fixing-post for the separate cigarette-lighter light-box/heat shield. (Photo's later if I give this a go.)

Photo's attached this time, though, of the Fujitsu Mini-book so you can appreciate how small it is.


Lukeyson

 

 

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File comment: Comparison with my day-to-day HP Full-sized Notebook. IMG_4661_WEB2.jpg [ 77.92 KiB | Viewed 1269 times ]

File comment: Daytime shot of Mini-Book in the car IMG_4653_web2.jpg [ 88.19 KiB | Viewed 1274 times ]

File comment: The effects of trying to run 640x480 on the ICC. It's not pretty, but it's OK. IMG_4657_WEB2.jpg [ 122.43 KiB | Viewed 1268 times ]

should get the black icc cover when you add the touch screen, sweet!

Well, the interior has been colour coded to brushed-aluminium and black. Piano-Black might work, but I reckon it would be out of place.

Exterior has been colour coded to Chrome/Silver, Black and Blueprint.


Lukeyson

Mounting a 13.5cm x 13.5xm by 1.5cm USB DVD drive in the Tissue Box tray.

Dimension wise, this looks like it might almost work, with the 'vertical' 1.5cm dimension being the only one that looks tight. I've got room beyond the tray to the edge of that lip you can see at the back - which means I could push the drive in further so that it is just out of view.

I'm feeling a certain sense of 'this was meant to be'......


Lukeyson

 

 

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File comment: This is the only dimension that is tight. But it does look like a 1.5cm high drive might fit. A friction fit would be awesome for ease of mounting.... IMG_4690_WEB2.jpg [ 72.02 KiB | Viewed 1266 times ]

File comment: Depth shows that worst-case we would project 1cm into the back of the unit. The 'lip' at the bottom is much deeper than this, so the drive could go back further. IMG_4688_WEB2.jpg [ 68.12 KiB | Viewed 1254 times ]

File comment: Width at the rear shows the 13.5cm can be easily accomodated IMG_4687_WEB2.jpg [ 65.98 KiB | Viewed 1256 times ]

Yeah that's what I'm talking about.

Haven't seen anything smaller. I guess they're limited by the fact it's a 12cm disc.

OK. I was thinking you had something smaller there for a minute!

That 1.5cm pic at the back needed a wider shot....


Lukeyson

 

 

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You said you found a source of 5v from the ICC. Can I have details. I need to find 5v with about 500mA.

I don't know how much current it can supply. But it's in the C-366 connector which is the ICC Video Input as the VR Line or 1533. It's connected from the ICC to the Sat Nav Module.

I first found it shown here: http://www.fordmods.com/forums/BA-Colou ... t-d38.html

I was able to find some connection details in the Workshop Manual but nothing to tell me how much it could supply.


Lukeyson

I gotcha.

I may just use it as a reference voltage. Make my own converter.

Thanks.

Dang, those motherboards are now officially 'overdue' according to the distributor. Jan 20th has come and gone and they're not in yet.

On a side note, I'm currently trying to talk our product guys into signing up as a mini-box reseller. They're doing the enquiries now.


Lukeyson

Touchscreen Overlay has arrived.

It's a 4-Wire resistive 'Touchkit' unit, more detail at www.touchkit.com. It was shipped with

- 1 x screen that measures 88mm x 143mm (3 1/2" x 5 5/8") - these are all to the outside edge of the glass, not within the 4-wire surround that would be visible on the ICC.
- 1 x 4-wire to USB Cable
- 1 x 4-wire USB Controller
- 1 x CD with drivers for 2000&XP

There are also drivers on the touchkit website for Vista, CE, NT, 9X, MAC and a whole raft of Linux distro's.



Lukeyson

 

 

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I also ordered a Slimline CD/DVD USB to combined E-IDE/Power enclosure this week.

I've found the Sony/Optiarc also do a slimline Blueray slot-load drive which would just be awesome, but alas it's a SATA drive, and I haven't found anything in the slimline enclosure range that does SATA to USB.

Then again, Blueray on a 640x480x60i seems a bit pointless when you think about it doesn't it. Even the LCD's we may be putting in the headrests for the 'Video Output Zone' wouldn't be able to take advantage of it.....


Lukeyson