Building a computer inside the dash of my car!

[Birdie2000]

Also, I've heard that with normal desktop hard drives, it works a lot better if you mount them on their side so that the platters don't slam into each other. If you did that along with some sort of vibration dampening, you should be fine. As for the laptop drive, I've heard those work great. They're made to take a bit of a beating.

[Steve Presley]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by slacker69:
As far as what people are saying about haveing problems with a harddrive messing up and stuff. I am using a laptop harddrive so it is made to be mobile. It will also be put in a soft drive cage as well to help absorbe some of the shock.<hr></blockquote>

Yeah, laptop drives are a little more stable, but still aren't really ruggedized, they are just a 2.5" form factor instead of a 3.5 or 5" factor like desktop hard drives.. if you can find a ruggedized drive, I would really recommend getting it.. the soft cage will help, but if the drive hits any of the supports, or is subjected to repeated movements, you could still have issues..

my $0.02

[Steve Presley]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Birdie2000:
Also, I've heard that with normal desktop hard drives, it works a lot better if you mount them on their side so that the platters don't slam into each other. If you did that along with some sort of vibration dampening, you should be fine. As for the laptop drive, I've heard those work great. They're made to take a bit of a beating.<hr></blockquote>

That's actually not true in this case.. you don't really need to worry about the movement of the platters (which is minimal), you need to worry about the movement of the reader arms.. by mounting it vertical, you suscept the reader arm and platters to more of a risk since the majority of abrupt movement is going to be up and down in a car. On a desktop application, you would be more susceptible to bumping the PC from side to side or front to back, so mounting the drive vertically does give minimally more protection...

And again, yes, laptop drives are more "Stable" than desktop drives, but again, the big difference is form factor and operating temperature, not ruggedization..

I still contend that solid state is the way to go.. FlashRAM, Memory Stick, Compact Flash, Secure digital.. no moving parts, nothing to break unless you drop the thing...

[ June 07, 2002: Message edited by: Steve Presley ]</p>

[knowledgefreak]

it is the power supply that will cause failures on harddrives... not how the drive is mounted.

Brown outs= very bad for harddrives...

[Skapimp]

I believe Clarion makes an in-dash computer for cars, it has windows ME on it.

[Steve Presley]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by knowledgefreak:
it is the power supply that will cause failures on harddrives... not how the drive is mounted.

Brown outs= very bad for harddrives...<hr></blockquote>

Yes, brown outs can cause major damage, but shaking a hard drive that is not ruggedized will do just as much damage...

BTW, just so everyone doesn't think I'm being an a$$ about all of this, I program mobile/wireless for a living.. I've done work with many ruggedized devices and have had many clients who opted for the cheaper units with laptop drives instead of solid state or ruggedized models, have put them through the kind of abuse (and worse) that we are talking about only to come back with $40k of wasted equipment to buy another $50k worth of ruggedized machines... it's worth the extra couple of hundred bucks to do it right the first time..

[slacker69]

where can i look at these rugged harddrives i may look into them. I will use the laptop harddrive at first cause i have extras laying around the house but i will look at the rugged harddrives give me a link or some names of companies

[Steve Presley]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by slacker69:
where can i look at these rugged harddrives i may look into them. I will use the laptop harddrive at first cause i have extras laying around the house but i will look at the rugged harddrives give me a link or some names of companies<hr></blockquote>

Summatec
Data Zone Also check out their "Databook" series.. the drives are certified up to 10,000 Gs


Panasonic also has a "Toughbook" line of laptops, so you could probably buy their drive direct.

Solid state drives are a bit more expensive, but check out the drives from SanDisk or the IBM Microdrives.