MFD touchscreen

Like many others on this board, I am intrigued at the possibility of playing DVDs and viewing various camera images and the like through the advanced tech provided by Coastal Electronic Technologies via the NavKit, etc.

But I wonder how the DVD will be controlled? Does the NavKit also intercept the touchscreen commands? And if so, does the receiving DVD player need some special interface?

In the touchscreen applications that I am familiar with, typically the touchscreen interfaces with the device (e.g. a PC) with a USB cable and then drivers on the PC translate this input into mouse commands, key presses, etc.

Is something similar possible with the MFD + NavKit?

I'm really looking to put together a macmini for my Prius and would like to avoid a separate touchscreen for it (far cleaner if I could leverage the MFD somehow). I still have to solve powerdown/up too but since the NavKit doesn't have an iPod interface the macmini could be my "ipod" (and I would use my real ipod everywhere else). Of course, I could play DVDs through the macmini as well.

thanks for any info...

 

thanks all - I know that it seems that our living rooms will be more capable than our cars but I aim to get a macmini going in my Prius if I can...

I meant to say the video controller not the navkit from coastal but this Freudian slip is actually a good one. As DanMan32 points out, keypresses are sent through the AVC network by the NavKit somehow (to kill the infernal I Agree).

So, I could take a built-to-order macmini (to add mem, wifi, bluetooth) and install it somewhere convenient in my Prius. Then, a hacked (or newer version) of the navkit could send touchscreen commands to the macmini (via USB?) by listening in on whatever bus that is (maybe it would only work on the map screen though - so there could be a better place in the Prius to do this...). Video and audio output would be through the video kit to the MFD and car audio respectively.

The macmini comes with iLife and iTunes I'm pretty sure. And if the in-built wifi were not enough at the nearby hotspot one of the broadband providers (e.g. Verizon) sell pretty decent wide area wireless @ 128K I believe. That's pretty close to having your living room in your Prius imho.

I can do all of this right now if I don't mind bypassing the MFD and use a touchscreen instead (such as this one: http://www.translinks.com/lilliput619.htm) but I much prefer integration with the MFD.

Right now, I'm pondering how I would power this in such a way that it could come on on it's own and power down when I shut the car down. If I figure that out before I figure out the MFD, I might just have to do this anyway and have two screens in the car somehow...

Someone already did this with a Lexus and there are other stories as well. Check out: http://www.123macmini.com/news/story/19.html

 

That is excellent news techogurl! So that's all I needed to tip me over: I think I will buy a build-to-order macmini and use it in my Prius in a cobbled together way (see below) until the Coastal solution is ready. Presumably that will be a cable harness or something that can be added to the video unit from Coastal? Hopefully, this will all be ready in time for me to use my tax refund on it... (otherwise, I'm sure I will spend that money on something else less worthy! )

cobbled together macmini solution
1. bto macmini (bluetooth, wifi, 1G ram)
2. inverter to provide AC for macmini
3. mini lcd touchscreen
4. run audio somehow into the car system (I presume there is an aux in somewhere handy in the Prius?)
5. bt keyboard (to do email and other typing in the car - not while I'm driving though!)

with this config, I can get started right away! I can re-purpose #3 to my diy pvr (which is headless right now) and re-route #4 when the Coastal solution is ready.

The last bit of the puzzle is what do about power: I can provide it through an inverter of course (once again, I wish the Prius just had this standard) but I want to power down/up gracefully. I was thinking I could have a mini ups of some kind that stayed charged off of the inverter. There might be a problem with that but assuming it could work, I might be able to have the macmini sense when the ups was not receiving a charge (there are drivers for this I believe) to put the macmini into sleep automatically. It could probably stay in sleep mode for a week I'm guessing and maybe I could trickle charge the ups with a solar panel. From sleep, powering up is just any event on the touchscreen...

 

Interesting! I'd like to learn more about that - I presume Google is not turning anything up on this but I will try to find details. I'm guessing everyone is looking and turing up nada.... I'll post what I turn up if anything...

 

ok, it looks like this is going to be really feasible so I am going to order my macmini some time today... I think I'm going to downgrade the memory (to 512M from the 1G I was planning) to afford the faster CPU and more importantly larger disk (80G). This way I can carry around my entire music library as well as soft copies of any DVDs I might want to watch (this will reduce the power consumption even more as I think it is cheaper energy wise to run the HD than the DVD).

As for power, running off of the 12V directly is a great idea! I might do the UPS thing anyway though because otherwise, I would have to shutdown the mini each time (and worse wait for it to boot). On a UPS, it could stay in sleep mode for days I'll bet.

For location, I was hoping for in-dash as well... maybe in the holder thing next to the driver's seat? I think there is 12V in there already. I just realized I also have to be careful about location to ensure that WiFi and BT work well.

Assuming Coastal will have their hands full for a while & therefore not be able to get to this integration in the near term, I will pick up the LCD monitor (and then re-purpose it when it is obsoleted by a connection path to the MFD). Therefore, I also have to figure out how to power the LCD monitor and where to mount it. I think I'm going to go for this one: http://www.translinks.com/lilliput619.htm

It should be interesting to get this working... I can't wait! Not only iTunes, iLife (especially iMail and iCal), etc. on the road but imagine a bluetooth headset connected to the mini running Skype! VoIP phone call from the car!!

 

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I can't find this kit for download anywhere on Apple's site. I even have developer access to the ADC part of the site and can't find anything there. Any pointers to it are appreciated...

Also, I'm zeroing in on an answer for the power supply. The most promising approach is a limited DIY DC-to-DC solution or I may just buy it complete (the P1900) from these folks (http://www.carnetix.com/) when available. Maybe I will just startup/shutdown the computer in the meantime. I'm certainly not going to wait as that would be far too sensible

I have to dig out from this site how XM is added to the standard car audio - I presume, I can fairly easily add the audio out from the mac mini to Sat1 or something? Or is it not going to be that easy? I don't want to do anything too permanent as I plan to eventually remove the lilliput lcd touchscreen to re-purpose it for home use on my pc pvr. I would then route macmini audio, video, mouse, etc. to the MFD via Coastal Dave's solution when it is available later this year. (I'm already thinking of writing an itty-bitty keyboard app in cocoa for the occasional typing that might be needed via the MFD).

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(techogurl\";p=\"70762)</div>

sounds good - please keep us posted... I wonder if he is talking about iDash? That's an open source project that is looking pretty cool (but early). See this URL: http://idash.sourceforge.net/

 

So, I just wanted to check something with the group real quick.

I found this device called AUX-BOX that seems to be an auxillary audio input thing (there's one model for the iPod too!). If I'm reading it correctly with the approp (included) wiring harness for the 05 Prius this thing just let's me plug in stereo audio input instead of XM. Do I plug into the JBL (the head unit?) or the CD changer? I have no idea what I'm talking about here.

I'm willing to give up the 6-CD changer to do this but it looks like I won't have to. I guess that once this widget is plugged in the system recognizes it or something?

I should be able to get decent sound quality from the stereo headphone jack to the RCA plugs theis aux-box thing has but I'm starting to wonder where I'm going to route all these wires.

Here's a link fyi to the gadget: http://www.pac-audio.com/auxbox/Default.htm

It looks like it's about $90-100 online.

 

thanks!