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You are dramatically underestimating the complexity and difficulty of "w/ quality control stipulations". I work in electronic device design. On a good project
by rkangel 10y ago
You are dramatically underestimating the complexity and difficulty of "w/ quality control stipulations".
I work in electronic device design. On a good project designing a complex device, 2/3 of the work will be iterations of design (software, electronic, mechanical, industrial). When you've finished designing it you've then got another 1/3 of getting it manufactured at a decent cost with a decent yield. And that's assuming that you have an existing relationship in China with a high end manufacturer. Weeks and weeks of trips out, production runs, implementation of QA.
Given that, how would you go about ensuring that what's coming out of a factory in China is actually up to scratch?
And even if you did, the processor on the Pi uses an unusual chip-on-chip technology that most board makers don't have the capability to build.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago> I work in electronic device design. Why?
- zild3d 10y agoIs it hard to guess why designing electronics could possibly be good/interesting work? It involves programming, design, physics, math, and making real things we use everyday - medical devices, cars, satellites, cameras, etc
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y agoIt sounded like no upside existed from his description.
- khedoros1 10y agoThey weren't trying to convince you that it's a pleasant occupation. I'm sure that the content of the comment would have a different emphasis if they were.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y agoThen the question still stands. What I'm getting at is, while QA might be hard I'm sure doing hard things might pay off some way instead of no way at all.
- khedoros1 10y agoThey weren't trying to describe the payoff, just the process...although the description did have some things that sound rewarding to me. - Iterating through a project and seeing new functionality implemented can be rewarding - The chase of business negotiations and inter-personal problem-solving can be rewarding "Why" just strikes me as an off-topic, unspecific, and weird question to ask.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y agoHe was describing why doing QA is hard, and I'm suggesting (not to you clearly) some good reason for doing it still exists or he wouldn't be in that business. I apologize for striking you as off-topic.
- ethbro 10y ago> When you've finished designing it you've then got another 1/3 of getting it manufactured at a decent cost with a decent yield. The difference here is that this is an already proven design? Have a competitive bid process for the right to market under the trademark, eliminate factories you flat out don't trust, then require ability to randomly sample and test on Pi's side. If pass rate drops below agreed parameters, revoke the trademark and pick another factory. Then let the factory self-QA or face the consequences. I can't imagine there are no factories in China that can make a profit on a chip that's being made profitably in the UK. The only argument I can see against it would be that a commercial market doesn't exist in any volume. But I can't imagine there wouldn't be decent profit vs {insert lower priced Pi clone here}. ... The other argument would be if Pi has an exclusivity agreement with Sony UK (who I believe is the majority manufacturer) that precludes this kind of deal in exchange for pricing? > "unusual chip-on-chip technology" You mean the package-on-package mounting of the SDRAM on top of the BCM2835? Defer to your experience, but if Raspberry Pi is doing this then how expensive/rare is the investment? I'm honestly trying to reconcile the following statements: "They're hard to manufacture" + "We make a profit on each one sold" + "We can't afford to make them at commercial scale"
- IanCal 10y ago> I can't imagine there are no factories in China that can make a profit on a chip that's being made profitably in the UK. One of their aims was to produce things in the UK. They didn't meet this initially, but with scale managed to bring production at least largely within the UK.
- ethbro 10y agoIsn't the entire reason we're having the "Pi can't / won't sell in industrial quantities" conversation because they can't scale production?
- IanCal 10y agoTheir initial scale at the first launch was too small to work with UK manufacturers, a bit later with the first version they were able to order large enough runs to have production in Wales iirc.