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Linux Software

MegaCar: Wireless Linux and Internet on the Road 47

Posted by CmdrTaco from the sign-me-up dept.
peter royal writes "MegaCar is a high-class Brabus 5.8 outfitted with a 153kbit/s wireless internet connection. It is 16 9.6kbit/s GSM modems in parallel, with a Linux box acting at the router." Just when you thought you'd seen everything.
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MegaCar: Wireless Linux and Internet on the Road More

MegaCar: Wireless Linux and Internet on the Road

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  • Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:

    It's already happened.
  • Most phone manufacturers have their own GSM modems, for example, Ericsson have the DC29. I'm sure Nokia have their own too.
  • Definitely not cheap. The site quoted $300K for the total cost of the car. $90K for just the computer equipment. I guess the people who can afford the car don't need to worry about their online costs.

  • hmph (Score:1)

    by tgd ( 2822 )
    Damn, beaten to the punch. Oh well I won't be the first, but I'll be one of the few with full-time internet in my car. Wish I had that kinda $$$. :)

    http://www.bangsplat.org/autolinux

  • Been there, done that. C'mon. Using several channels to compound the network bandwidth has been available for Linux for several years now. I'd be surprised if it's not part of the standard kernel. The name of this technology escapes me presently, but should be documented in one of the net-howto's.

  • Serious security problems, potentially, a real can of worms.

    Suddenly, the phrases "crash the server" and "Ping O' Death" rise to a grim new level of literal reality.

  • I bet your head still hurts from where your mother dropped you years ago.

  • /.ed? (Score:1)

    by jshare ( 6557 )
    Is it slashdotted already? I couldn't get in....
  • I can't get onto the site, so I can't confirm, but DAMN that has to be expensive. I priced GSM modems about a year ago, and they're 35 cents a minute BEYOND your normal cellular charge. x16, that's $8.00 a minute during prime time! An hour of internet access costs $240! Nutbag.
  • I've been trying to find an affordable GSM modem to no avail. I'm currious as to what kind of unit these guys are using. I wonder if it is one of these [pccard.se] or this [falcom.de].
    If anybody knows of some other GSM modems out there I'd love to hear about them. Any body ever get a Linux box to talk to a Nokia 2190?
  • Here in Auckland, NZ an ISP of sorts, KCBBS , supports a Wavelan connection locally up to a maximum of 15km. These cards apprently give you around 2mbps with the correct antennae.
    This would be a far cheaper option if you didn't need it outside of the central business district.
    Maybe they'll lend me a card to test this theory. ;-)
    Imagine what the cost would be like using the Iridium connection. Yikes. Have to wait a couple of years
  • A stock S500 is $ 77,500 if my memory serves, so you're actually paying $ 132,500 to the engine/handling tuning folks. You could always do this on the "cheap" by getting the car for $ 77,500 and the hardware for $ 90,000, making a $ 167,500 vehicle. That's not nearly as bad as 295,000/300,000 (note how Tom and MegaCar have a rather petty $ 5 price difference).

    If you wait, you'll probably get a discount on the car. I wouldn't count on that now, because the new S500 is looking to be a pretty hot car, but in six months to a year you should be able to find a Mercedes dealer willing to dicker.

    You'll also have to wait for the traffic sensing cruise control, which automatically activates the brakes when it sees you coming too close to the car in front of you. With features like that, the S500 seems like an appropriate car to fit out.

    I have pictures of the new S-Class (on which Megacar is based) at http://www.amazing.com/portfolio/auto-show/ .

    D

    ----
  • ... is in the Linux kernel, and has been for some time. It's the EQL driver - this is used to support serial line load balancing. What you have is balancing across 16 GSM links.

    The catch is the other end has to support your setup - either with a Linux box with 16 inputs, or with something like Livingston Portmaster 2e (as taken from the kernel help file for the driver). Read drivers/net/README.eql under the source tree for more details.

  • yeah, they had to increase the engine capacity to 5.8l (stroker crank or rebore?) to provide enough power for the Pentiums ;-) I wonder if the 170mph top speed is with the damn peecees turned off?

    -t.
  • one word:

    Beowulf

    *duck*

  • Mega Weapon! Mega Weapon! Mega Weapon!

    He the greatest!

    . . . What?!? This whole thing isn't about Mega Weapon? Well, Mega Weapon is still cool! You can't take that away from him! He was the best character in "Warrior of the Lost World".
  • Looks like you got the URL wrong. I found it at:
    http://www.amazing.com/david/portfolio/auto-show/ [amazing.com]

    ~PanIc~
  • The PII System is running Linux as the router for the net connection. The main workstation (PIII 500) is running WinNT from what i've read.

    ~PanIc~

  • I wonder if they have any good anti-theft devices planned for this car. I'd hate to shell out the dough for this car then never see it again.

    ~PanIc~

  • There is Flash for Linux, isn't it?

    You really should visit the site
    http://www.megacar.com/
    It's really cool.
  • Hey! Cool idea! With a little more ingenuity, you could come up with a way to actually control the car's major functions through a telnet session, look out the windshield with the streamed video connection, and drive your car from your desktop!

    It's the wave of the future - you can drive anywhere you want, and never leave your desk!

    *vroom*
    Me:"Hey, this works pretty well!"
    Realplayer: Net Congestion Detected, dropping framerate by 75.3 percent
    Me:"Dang it!"
    telnet> echo stop>/dev/engine
    telnet> echo stomp>/dev/brakes
    telnet> echo pull>/dev/emergencybrake
    *SKREEEEEECH*
    Connection lost.

    --jwriney
    John Riney
    jwriney@awod.com

  • Well, look at it this way: a human driver would cost less per hour than using the GSM system itself (estimated at $240/hour by another /. reader) *grin*
    Methinks someone who can afford this has a driver, no doubt about it. Besides, regulations would never allow the driver to be distracted this way. For example, the article mentions that the video screens can only be viewed from the backseats.

    Actually, some people here (NL) got a ticket for 'reckless driving' because they were talking on their mobile phones without a handsfree set; instead they squeezing the phone between their shoulder and their head, which doesn't steer very well...

  • Yet another development that's going to cause people to crash into trees.
  • Sweet

    --
  • My thoughts exactly. He would eat up almost all the resources on a 3 radio site if there was no other traffic, let alone try to start the thing up during rush hour. Sounds like a nice little denial of service attack to me.
  • what's next a dog with an sco unix server around
    neck ?
    a cat with a RAID server at his 19" industrial
    server/food rack ?

    ;)

    --hacketti
  • Wow. 16 modems?

    I work for a GSM provider. If we had one of these suckers driving around, he'd congest our network as soon as he fliped it on.

    The only way he'd be able to get all 16 up and running all at the same time is at night in the down town area.

    Not to say that this isn't really cool. ;)
  • Although I think only two of them are used by the GSM modems. There's some sort of GSM booster box thingie replacing the spare tire that makes this possible.
  • Here's one impementation which has cruise control, infra-red remote control for central locking,
    smart burglar alarm and air conditioner control done with one Motorola 68HC11 Microcontroller with internal EEPROM. Although MP3-player is missing..

    Ville
  • Hi Linux Folx,

    i developed MEGACAR with my "dataprotect.com" team.

    Megacar was the MEGA-CEBIT-SUCCESS for us with over 20 sold cars. Now we are searching for good programmers and linux (unix) experts to help us making megacar even better.

    My Company is going public next year and we have nice jobs and a stockoptionplan to offer. Please mail me at kim@dataprotect.com if interested.

    by the way, who is "gravenreuth" ???
    thx for the interest for megacar on this forum.
    ciao
    kim

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