help a newbie please!

Hi everyone,

Me and my brothers build clone computers and i had a spare lying around and decided to make a mobile mp3 player.  I am going the easy route for powering the computer by using a power inverter that plugs into cigarette jack. 

but the mobile monitor i'm using has wires for DC 12+ and a ground wire.  where the heck should i connect these too?

my other newbie question is what kind of fm modulator should i use for hooking up my sound card from computer to?  i heard fm modulators make alot of static though.

thanks,

the car is a 1991 jeep cherokee sport inline 6

-------------
Where is the horn that was blowing? They have passed like rain on the mountains. Like wind in the meadow. The days have gone down in the west. Behind the hills, into shadow. How did it come to this?

the ground should go to the chassis. you need to fuse the power wire and i would come off the battery with a switch of some sort. just make sure that the switch is off when you start the car so you dont spike the monitor.

good luck,
david

ok,  thanks,  I have a friend with some experience as to these matters, with your advice and his guidence, we shall do what we can!

thankyou and I appreciate it.

-------------
Where is the horn that was blowing? They have passed like rain on the mountains. Like wind in the meadow. The days have gone down in the west. Behind the hills, into shadow. How did it come to this?

I did that last summer. I took it out after a few weeks because I never used it. It was easier to use the car's CD Player. But it was kind of cool to have a computer working in the car. Maybe if I hooked it to my cell phone and I could surf the Internet from anywhere. hmm! maybe I'll put it back in.

I was using a P233 MHz computer with a 200 watt power supply and a 200 watt power converter and it sucked the life out of the car's battery very quickly.

I had a good FM Modulator that I used and it was fine. No static. I am now using the modulator for a DVD player in the same van.

yeah, I'm kinda wondering if i should upgrade my alternator to the 165 amps.

but it's a pain to reach the alternator, 

what kind of battery and car did you use for that 200 watt inverter and power supply on pc that sucked the juice so much?   I bet it was how loud you were playing it too that would effect it.

-------------
Where is the horn that was blowing? They have passed like rain on the mountains. Like wind in the meadow. The days have gone down in the west. Behind the hills, into shadow. How did it come to this?

i ask what kind of battery and car because a 200 mhz computer only uses about 5 watts for the cpu, and 5 or 10 watts for the motherboard and cd rom driver each.

-------------
Where is the horn that was blowing? They have passed like rain on the mountains. Like wind in the meadow. The days have gone down in the west. Behind the hills, into shadow. How did it come to this?

I was in a '97 Mercury Villager. Stock battery (not sure what it is) and alt. The 200 watt power supply was all I had laying around so I used it. The power inverter was just a cheap "Canadian Tire" special.

I had one of those 5.6" inch lcd moitors in the headrest that was used as the monitor, plus the computer and the stereo all running at the same time that killed the battery so fast. If the Van was running it was fine though. We drove 4 hours on a hwy with no problems. The only time I killed the battery was when the engine was off.

Odessa wrote:

---

but the mobile monitor i'm using has wires for DC 12+ and a ground wire.  where the heck should i connect these too?is a 1991 jeep

---

Couldnt you just hook the DC 12v+ and ground wire to the yellow and black wire coming out of the computer power supply? the yellow wire is 12v, and the 2 black wires are ground, and the red wire is 5v (this being on the connectors that go into the hard drive, cdrom drive, etc