I want to run a laptop in my car and the one that i currently have has a dead battery as in wont charge. I want to know the best way to power it inside the car without having a battery for it. Do i need to get some sort of inverter and if so what specs should i look for. Does anyone else have a laptop wired into their car. Thanks for the help.

 

all you would need to do is find out how big the power supply is for the laptop (should say right on it) and then get a invertor that is big enough to handle it.. i'm pretty sure they are less than 100watts so a 150watt invertor would be plenty.

 

looks like that is probably my cheapest option. I am always seeing though that they have low battery shutdown. Im kinda confused by this. I just assumed that they ran of the electrical power from the car and then to the appliance. Does the inverter itself and dissipate a charge after if has been used for a certain amount of time or will it allow the appliance to run as it pleases and as long.

 

Just plug it into the outlet.

If you don't have an outlet, I'd say the inverter idea is the only way to go. A 150 watt inverter is probably $20-$30 nowadays.. probably cheaper than a replacement battery for the laptop. The small inverters can plug right into the cigeratte lighter outlet. The low battery shutdown is a feature most inverters have. If you're running it with the car off, they'll shut down before they completely drain the car battery.

 

thats a really good idea. I was thinking about something like that but putting it maybe in the side of the center counsle but i dont think that there is room. How did you run that the wires for that. I would really like something like that.

 

I ran the wires under the carpet along the transmission tunnel, back to the glove compartment in the trunk. I have the inverter in there. The outlet fits perfectly in the old ash tray hole, so it's an easy swap back to stock if you ever want to get rid of it.

-Bryan