Nov/Dec 2003

The Metropolitan Police is fitting in-cab computers in 1,200 of its vehicles. Crews will use them for a whole range of mobile computing and communication purposes, including automatic vehicle location and consulting the Police National Computer.

The company has chosen Microbus to supply the equipment. Its M-PC system is built round an Intel Pentium III processor, and is e-marked and Home Office-approved to AES5 standard. It is said to be particularly well suited to this application, being resistant to shock, temperature and vibration.

The Met is also buying special keyboards to provide officers with a compact, robust interface. Microbus has also provided a large, flexible touch screen which is designed to provide plenty of display area within a minimal enclosure.

The supplied unit has expansion capability to support applications such as automatic number plate recognition, fingerprint scanning and barcode reading.