What is an In-vehicle PC?
The In-Vehicle PC is a high capability Windows XP/2000 computer designed to survive the harsh vehicle environment by cooperating with the vehicle. It offers high brightness colour TFT touch screens for ease of use. The shock, vibration, temperature and voltages it must be designed to survive are those defined by the vehicle.

As well as offering a full desktop PC capability, the vehicle PC provides greater connectivity for peripherals within the vehicle. It should be designed to support optimal positioning of antenna to maintain best coverage and most accurate GPS position.

The electrical noise will be minimised so as not to reduce the coverage of voice or data communications systems such as PMR, TETRA, TETRAPOL, GSM, 3G, GPRS or others.

A selection of screens are available to allow optimum screen size compared to space available within the vehicle. The selection of screen sizes give the opportunity to design the system into the vehicle.

The In-Vehicle PC is also known as a Vehicle PC, Car PC, CarPuter, Auto PC or Bus PC, MDT (Mobile Data Terminal) or Vehicle / In-Vehicle Computer.

How do Vehicle PCs compare against other products such as desktops, laptops, rugged laptops or tablets?
Desktops benefit from the space in an office and a stable environment. Laptops and tablets are mobile computers and designed as an extension to the person. Vehicle PCs have to be designed for wide temperature operation, continuous vibration, shock and to cooperate with the vehicle voltages.

Unlike the laptop / tablet, being able to start and stop the Vehicle PC from the ignition is an obvious requirement. Managing an orderly shutdown before the vehicle's battery is drained to a degree which threatens its ability to start the engine also needs to be part of the specification of a Vehicle PC. Laptops/tablets will not be designed to the same criteria and would therefore drain the vehicle battery.

Advanced Vehicle PCs will also offer the capability to manage the power to other peripherals, for example, turning on and off the modem, printers or cameras.

Why is a range of screen sizes needed?
Different vehicles offer different available space, however, you will always want to offer the same capabilities to the system regardless of screen size. Having a separate system unit ensures all installations have the same capability, regardless of screen size.

Why have a high brightness colour TFT touch screen?
Being able to see the screen easily in the high ambient light of a vehicle is as crucial as a full dimming range for night use. Many applications for fleet use of Vehicle PC use are designed for touch screen control with keyboards only being used for bulk data input.
Advanced Vehicle PCs will also have an OnScreen application control system, Microbus offers the OnScreen Task Switch system.

Health and Safety.
Post-fit vehicle electronics need to meet legislative standards, for Europe this is the e-mark, for United Nations this is the E-mark. This is crucial to limit the chance of conducted and/or radiated emissions affecting the vehicle safety systems (see EMC Technote).

Fleet managers purchasing equipment not designed for vehicle use should qualify equipment to the "e" / "E" mark standard.

Different screens sizes support Heath and Safety approved installations into vehicles but still offer the same system capability.