PC based marine electronics?

[dacust]

Originally Posted by David M

Dan,
I have four computers on a research vessel that gets hit by "square" chop on the SF Bay on a frequent basis. The boat goes 20 knots and frequently gets some pretty severe G forces. I have yet to see a hard drive failure. Just in my own experience, the boats movement is not a factor in hard drive failures. I did once drop a Raptor drive on the floor and that was the end of that...$ouch$.

I dropped a WD from about 2 feet, at an angle, so it skidded across the floor. It is still running fine. Mind you, I was surprised. But your experience matches what I've thought about HDDs on boats.

Originally Posted by David M

Of course you want to back things up onto DVD's as well in case a voltage spike takes out everything that was connected.

Backups, backups, backups.

Originally Posted by David M

BTW, I too like making high end water cooled computers. ..lots of fun. I'm surprised in your rig that you did not use the Koolance radiator?

KIT-1000SL Kit, Silver [no nozzles] - Water cooling systems, pc liquid cooling kit, cpu, video card, hard drive

The Koolance radiator is $300 vs about $100 for the one I used. That's why. The reason I used so much Koolance elsewhere was just that they were the ones carying the products I liked best. I actually spent a lot of time looking at all makes. Wasn't until I started putting it together that it dawned on me it was almost all Koolance. If I had been buliding an Intel, probably would have not been their waterbolcks for the CPU and NB, not because what they have is bad, but just because I like some others better.

Originally Posted by David M

XP only needs 2 Gigs of RAM..in fact, thats all it can use. RAM now is pretty dirt cheap. You can get 2 Gigs of DDR2 PC2 6400 RAM easily for under $100. Newegg.com - CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Retail

Actually I was talking about the disk space needed, or more accurately the amount of solid state memory that would be needed for XP.

BTW: I have similar views on marinized electronice. If I'm going to have it outside, like VHF, GPS, etc., then I absolutely want it marninzed. Anything on my 16' center console: marinized. TVs, computers, stereos that are mounted inside the cabin of the big boat? I don't bother. Now, if I was in a sailboat that could get water inside during bad weather and did offshore a lot I would take a different view on some or all of that. Some for safety reasons I'd definately want marinized, some would depend on cost vs possibility of damage. Otherwise, a small TV for $300 marinized vs <$100? I think I could just try to keep it out of the wet and take my chances.

-dan

[scotte]

Originally Posted by dacust

I dropped a WD from about 2 feet, at an angle, so it skidded across the floor. It is still running fine. Mind you, I was surprised.

Just a comment that when a drive is powered down it parks the head and can take a significant amount more abuse than an operating drive can. I believe some laptop drives have shock sensors in them that will automatically park the head in the case of shock while running.

As far as backups go, DVD is ok but it takes forever and results in a stack of media. The option I use is a USB drive enclosure. You can buy them complete, or as a kit. I had an existing 200GB IDE drive, so just bought an enclosure kit for $30. I only power up the drive when I'm using it. High-speed USB is quite fast.

[gettinthere]

I'm thinking of placing a laptop at the nav station below. I'd like to have a monitor (8" - 12") at the helm displaying the same laptop display. Looking for suggestions on what monitor to consider and how to get the signal there; wired or wireless? I think I can use a wireless mouse to control the laptop below.