This money is burning a hole in my pocket. I've gone from starving college student to John D Rockefeller, Jr., or at least it seems that way after contrasting the two situations I've been in recently.
During the last three years of college I was able to work 10 hours a week (excluding summers, which were 20 hour weeks) at $7 an hour programming for the University. Now, I'm working full-time as a programmer where my first raise was more than the total amount of pay I recieved during a year working for Tech. Of course with an entry level programming job, I'm only making a beggar's fortune, but in comparison to my college days I'm doing fantastic.
Of course I've got things to spend my money on... like a girlfriend, school loans, car insurance, an engagement ring, and food. Even with those eating away at my wad of cash, I've still got something I've never had before... expendable income.
The latest and greatest fantasy I've envisioned involves a 8" touch screen LCD, a VIA EPIA mini-ATX computer integrated with my car stereo. I could have a detachable LCD screen (used more like an interactive remote than a simple display), controlling a PC in the car. I'm talking about a media center for my car.
I could play DVD's for passengers on trips to Monroe, or trips to Ruston. Instead of burning mp3 cd's for each trip, or occasion, I could simply create a new playlist. GPS navigation for my car would become an affordable option. If I wanted to get pimpish I could even hook up a ps2 or Xbox to the same monitor and have a mobile game station.
For anyone else who finds this appealing, I have a couple prices and sources for you.
These were the only two items I didn't really know a price range for or a source for off-hand. The rest of the items are normal computer parts. The only slightly unusual options involve the PSU and the Hard Drive. You can buy a special power supply for 12V batteries and you can also opt for a compactflash based hard drive to avoid wear on hard drives due to vibrations. I believe everything you'd need can be found on logicsupply.com.
I'm gonna explore the idea a little more and maybe save a little money over the next year or so to buy a system.
Posted by Jordan at May 9, 2005 8:06 PM | TrackBack