Quote:
because it could potentially be produced for less than the cost of the 160GB drive in it. (think chip on board and metalized plastic)

Still not seeing the attraction. If you're going from scratch basically then you should try and reduce the size of the unit.

Quote:
What I meant by off the shelf was the processor and related chip sets, it would be in essence a custom PC in a DIN case with the extra unneeded crap omitted.

Off the shelf in the PC world implies that you can buy a bunch of these bits, bolt them together and you have a fully working PC. What your'e talking about is a huge amount of custom development and work. It has been done by others before. Usually it sells for some stupidly high price. Can't find the link at the moment but there was a 2 unit set which had the PC part in one and the LCD in the other.

The easiest way to do what you're thinking of is to buy one of the various SBCs out there and add bits onto it. It won't be cheap but it'll still be cheaper than starting from scratch yourself unless you have visions of selling thousands of these things.

Quote:
just OLED display w/touch screen interface,serial ports,USB on the go,fire wire,bluetooth,irda,802.11 something,kick ass audio chip set w/digital out+RCA,ATA interface,a few geek ports

If you're having everything and the kitchen sink installed, you might as well add back in the PS/2 ports and the VGA output.

Quote:
being an X86 compatible it can run Linux

It doesn't need to be an IA32 architecture to run Linux. In this application, you would be better suited to an XScale design of some kind. An Intel IXP or PXA would work well and be cheaper.