Hello everyone,

I'm planning on installing an old pc in my car for mp3 playback only. I'm using Smartie 5.2 for my 40x4 LCD display-parallel port connected and Winamp 5.0 for mp3 playback.
Because the pc shuts down every time i turn of the motor, when it boots again i'm getting this scandisk procedure which is delaying my computer to start up. Does anyone know how can i avoid this procedure? Any ideas of how can i make the pc to start up faster?

I'm also using through the com1 a circuit for measuring the tempratures inside the cabin and outside the car. The tempratures are being logged every 1 minute to a .txt file like this:
07-07-2004 13:37:22 24.3 C 32.1 C
07-07-2004 13:38:22 24.8 C 32.3 C
Does anyone know how can i log every 1 minute only the first temprature to an inside.txt and only the second temprature to an outside.txt without the dates and time, by using this original txt file???

Thank you in advance.

The mp3 system:
Gigabyte motherboard (VIA chipset)
PIII-933Mhz Underclocked to 700Mhz for the heat in the trunk
S3+Trio64V 2MB graphics card
224MB RAM PC-100
CREATIVE SoundBlaster PCI-Sound card
HDD: Quantum Fireball 2.1GB

You could use an extra battery to keep the PC running when you cut the power to it! Hehe. There are UPS's that will shut your computer down FOR you.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

You'll definately want to do something like Crashman suggested with Win 98. FAT32 absolutely HATES being shut down improperly.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>

""Does anyone know how can i avoid this procedure?""

Uhhuh. Hit "Cansel" BUTTEN.

""Any ideas of how can i make the pc to start up faster?""

Yep. Sing to it


..this is very useful and helpful place for information...

Start > Run > enter: "msconfig" (without quotes)

On General page click on "Advanced"

The 7th box down allows you to "Disable Scandisk after bad shutdown"



"If it weren't for the last minute, alot of things wouldn't get done"

Please let us know how you made out.

I'm doing something similar but I'm only experimenting (OK, I'm just playing) but I am trying to figure out the best, cheapest, easiest way to do it.

Right now I'm using MPXPLAY which is DOS based multi-format player. It needs a DOS 32-bit extender. (I'm using the DOS/4GW version).

I'm currently playing with a K6-2 400 system with small HD. (It's all I have to spare). Very acceptable results.

My first test was an Athlon XP at 2.1 Ghz. That is overkill.

Next I played with a CD-ROM only player. I didn't use any hard drive at all. I created a bootable CDR with about 400 megs worth of MP3s (192 kbit/s). The test system boots from the CD and immediately plays the MP3s in random order (my preference).

This worked extremely well, at least with a generic CMedia 8738 PCI sound card.

It didn't work as well with any of my other soundcards. MPXPLAY takes a long time (~3 minutes) identifying those other sound cards and I need the original DOS utility/driver to use them.

I don't need any additional software for the CMedia card.

The documentation states that only 3 or 4 PCI cards are directly supported. Those are SB Live, Audigy 1 & 2, Cmedia 8738, and VIA onboard.

Other cards are supported if they have SB/SB PRO emulation but the MPXPLAY author warns that SB PRO emulation only has 22 Khz sampling.

More cards are supported when running with Windows but for me that defeats the purpose of my minimalist system.

I was hoping to duplicate my CDROM only system using just a K6-2(or lower) but performance was a bit slow for CDROM only play. MP3s play fine from a hard drive but there are lags playing from the CDROM. It could be the CDROM I'm using which is 5+ years old or it could be that I'm only using 64 MB RAM. However, I think I need a little more performance for my CDROM only plan.

Ultimately I would like a car system to do three things.

1) Play any CD that is installed in the CDROM. (CD audio or MP3 data). (I wonder if I can find acceptable slot loaded CDROM drives?)

2) Copy an MP3 data disc (user option) to the hard drive.

3) Play music from the HD.

MPXPLAY supports some LC displays, mice, and joyticks but I haven't investigated anything but the using a mouse.

MPXPLAY also works without a standard video display. (Well supposedly. It's my next test). My "prototype" car player would be the one that just plays my custom, bootable, MP3 discs.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by phsstpok on 07/27/04 06:12 PM.</EM></FONT></P>