Apple TV in car

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Level 4

1,570 points

Apple TV in car

I have an old apple tv (40 GB) and I wanted to put it in my car to use as a media center. I dont want to output video, just audio, so i have the ATV in the truck, with a cheap belkin g router. the ATV then hooks up to the stereo through its RCA jacks with an RCA to headphone jack adapter that plugs into my aux in port for the stereo. pretty much I'm replacing my ipod with an apple tv, and when I have my ipod plugged in that way it sounds great.

Now the problem.

I am powering both the apple tv and the router with an extension cord that plugs into my cars (2007 passat) 110 volt outlet which is between the front seats. I get a very loud buzz as soon as i plug the apple tv in. it doesnt even have to turn on, as soon as the power reaches it it makes a very loud buzz through the car stereo. I also vhecked to make sure it wasnt the headphone extension cable i used to get it to the aux in in the glovebox by pluggin an ipod in, and it sounded fine, so i must be the apple tv.

The power outlet im plugging it in to says its rated at 150 watts, and it powers my macbook pro fine, with no problems. it also charges my iphone without any issues, and powers the router with no problems. What could the issue be? one of my friends told me it might be that the inverter thats built into the car doesnt put out a clean sine wave, but i wanted to make sure that could be the reason before i ran out and spent 100 bucks on a pure sine wave inverter. does that sound like it could be it? also, the apple tv doesnt buzz when I hook it into my home stereo system

Thanks in advance

Aldo

Mac Pro 2.66/Quicksilver 2002 933/Apple TV/15" MBP 2.4, Mac OS X (10.6.4), iPhone 2G 8 GB/ iPod Shuffle 2G 1 GB

Posted on Jan 9, 2011 11:36 PM

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Answer 1

Jolly Giant

Level 7

25,464 points

Jan 10, 2011 1:06 AM in response to Aldo Mannino

FWIW, pop by this site: [ CarNetix|http://www.carnetix.com>.

J GG

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Answer 2

Aldo Mannino Author

Level 4

1,570 points

Jan 13, 2011 12:33 PM in response to Jolly Giant

Those are DC-DC, and i neek a DC-AC, because the apple tv doesnt have a power brick

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Answer 3

Jolly Giant

Level 7

25,464 points

Jan 14, 2011 4:15 AM in response to Aldo Mannino

you could contact these guys and ask if they have something that suits your situation.

best of luck !

J GG

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Answer 4

Jan 15, 2011 3:31 PM in response to Aldo Mannino

We're developers of advanced voice recognition software and have built two car demo systems now using Mac Mini's and not Apple TV. Some points to consider. The Apple TV runs very hot and shuts down when too hot. The ventilation will be critical. HDDs and cars don't work together well. We killed two automotive-grade HDDs, and shifted to FLASH memory drives ($$$) to eliminate the problems with HDDs and typical auto vibration/environments. Be sure to use some delays on power up/down as there are lots of transients during starting the car. Connectors also need attention due to vibration and environments. Neither device was made for a car, but we now find the Mac Mini with FLASH drives is quite good. For more info on us visit "speakwithme" dot com. Our VOICEDJ is a free app on the app store.

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Answer 5

Rudegar

Level 10

170,670 points

Jan 16, 2011 2:52 AM in response to Aldo Mannino

it's defficult to walk around in car pimpup stores without falling over lighter dc ->230 volt converters
http://www.laptopsforless.com/laptop-accessories/dc-ac-power-inverter/

atv1 do use 48watt even on standby so I'd disconnect it when not being used or your car will not start
because the batt
is flat
(look I'm a poet and didn't even know it!)

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Answer 6

Jan 27, 2011 2:04 PM in response to Aldo Mannino

Hi,
This is highly likely to be an issue with the AC output of the inverter. Your friend is correct that it won't be outputting a true sinewave, just an approximation of one. Depending on the quality it might not be much like a sinewave at all, possibly just a squarewave.

Certain devices are very sensitive to a clean power supply and IT is one of them. Your macbook pro takes a domestic supply and the power supply then converts this to a DC supply before it enters the macbook. The lack of true sinewave will have a much reduced affect on it subsequently.

Since the only thing you have changed is the power supply (I take it you have powered it up back in the house again to test it hasn't developed a fault before installing in the car?) then it is almost certainly the supply in the car. A high quality inverter "may" fix your issue but not necessarily as it is still trying to approximate a sinewave and whilst it may get very close, it will never truly do that. Whether it is close enough will depend on the sensitivity of the device you are trying to power.

The only way to know for sure it to try it out. A decent store will let you do that before to part with your cash so why not try it?

A word of warning: Long term use of inverters to power devices (particularly those requiring a true sinewave) can shorten the lifespan of said device. I have no personal experience of this but it is what I understand to be true.

Good luck and let me know how you get on.

Rich

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Answer 7

Jul 7, 2011 5:07 AM in response to Aldo Mannino

You dont need an DC AC, the appletv powerboard runs off 5vDC power, you need to crack open the AppleTV thorugh out the Power brock and wire up a DCDC converter that steps 12v to 5v DC has about 1amps and can handle about 50w, likely have a heatsink. BUt should happily keep running no problem.

Aslong as your not too precious about wiring up the power supply its a pretty straight forward hack.

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