4 ms·

> . Why is the ECU designed around low cost on-board, non-replaceable constructs like this? What's not replaceable or too expensive about a $400 or so nVidia T

> . Why is the ECU designed around low cost on-board, non-replaceable constructs like this? What's not replaceable or too expensive about a $400 or so nVidia Tegra board in a $100k car? > Nobody asked Tesla to shave $1 on the ECU assembly Are you suggesting it would have cost Tesla $1 per car to go from an industry standard board used in many cars to a custom solution with all parts tested in-house?

ggm 7y ago
Why doesn't any other manufacturer of cars have a similar problem? Did I miss the story where BMW or Mercedes demand $1200 to replace this part? Tesla knew it wanted a highly digital logging investment and they didn't design for use life. Doesn't feel like a sensible place to be. But to your main point, no. The actual cost per board of getting a design done for replaceable parts would have been higher. Once they hit volume the amortization would kick in. But for the earliest, yes,expensive. Strangely in the world of eg routers, the first gen often has more hackabilty, more removable parts and it's the later ones which shrink down, gets the bill of materials down. Seriously, they should comp all the replacements for the life of the car, just for p.r. value.
- pmorici 7y ago
  No other manufacture does over the air software updates. This problem stems from the fact that the firmware image got bigger with each update as incredible new features were added leaving the logs to be written over a smaller area. Also soldered on eMMC is probably less prone to failure than removable microsd under typical automotive conditions.
  - urschrei 7y ago
    Jaguar's I-PACE has OTA updates.
    - pmorici 7y ago
      Barely you still have to manually update the nav system. I pace only implemented partial updates recently due to competitive pressures from Tesla. Frankly I’ve heard mostly horror stories about ipace.
    - davewritescode 7y ago
      BMW also does OTA updates now as well.
  - sebcat 7y ago
    Why are logs (which I assume is not something the car needs in order to function) written to the same eMMC as the firmware?
    - jessaustin 7y ago
      von Neumann architecture strikes again!
  - emilecantin 7y ago
    Just drove a rental Dodge Durango last week, and it was asking me to do updates each time I shut it down. I think Tesla were the first, but everyone does it nowadays.
- zaroth 7y ago
  > Why doesn't any other manufacturer of cars have a similar problem? Did I miss the story where BMW or Mercedes demand $1200 to replace this part? This particular issue may be unique to Tesla, but obviously other car manufacturers have a whole host of issues which their customers deal with and can result in service bills even staggeringly higher than this. My last Infiniti G35 has an issue with the Bose head unit, where a single resistor would come loose and the radio would lose power when you hit a bump. The problem was the whole center console stack of buttons all were powered through the radio and so you would also lose the ability to change the temperature or turn on the defogger. Cost was $2400 to replace the unit, and they would typically fail again ever few years. The problem was extremely widespread and despite a campaign to get Infiniti to extend the warranty, they never did. I ended up putting in an after-market unit but I had to replace the module with all the climate control buttons as well with one from the Japanese market version of the same car, because that one could work independently from the radio.
yabadabadoes 7y ago
> What's not replaceable or too expensive about a $400 or so nVidia Tegra board in a $100k car? https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/community/lifecycle https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/community/lifecycle Tesla needs to have stock relative to replacement rate purchased before nVidia's last ship date. So if they used eMMC built in to a part like this then they should be raising problems for their parts logistics.
- hef19898 7y ago
  Wouldn't be surprised if spare parts logistics turn out to be a pain for Tesla.
  - lazyjones 7y ago
    Not anymore in this case since they replaced this with their own design. Upgrading older cars should be possible, but is rumoured to be prohibitively expensive for Tesla as the moment, since other components have to be swapped as well.

ggm 7y ago

Why doesn't any other manufacturer of cars have a similar problem? Did I miss the story where BMW or Mercedes demand $1200 to replace this part? Tesla knew it wanted a highly digital logging investment and they didn't design for use life. Doesn't feel like a sensible place to be. But to your main point, no. The actual cost per board of getting a design done for replaceable parts would have been higher. Once they hit volume the amortization would kick in. But for the earliest, yes,expensive. Strangely in the world of eg routers, the first gen often has more hackabilty, more removable parts and it's the later ones which shrink down, gets the bill of materials down. Seriously, they should comp all the replacements for the life of the car, just for p.r. value.

pmorici 7y ago
No other manufacture does over the air software updates. This problem stems from the fact that the firmware image got bigger with each update as incredible new features were added leaving the logs to be written over a smaller area. Also soldered on eMMC is probably less prone to failure than removable microsd under typical automotive conditions.
- urschrei 7y ago
  Jaguar's I-PACE has OTA updates.
  - pmorici 7y ago
    Barely you still have to manually update the nav system. I pace only implemented partial updates recently due to competitive pressures from Tesla. Frankly I’ve heard mostly horror stories about ipace.
  - davewritescode 7y ago
    BMW also does OTA updates now as well.
- sebcat 7y ago
  Why are logs (which I assume is not something the car needs in order to function) written to the same eMMC as the firmware?
  - jessaustin 7y ago
    von Neumann architecture strikes again!
- emilecantin 7y ago
  Just drove a rental Dodge Durango last week, and it was asking me to do updates each time I shut it down. I think Tesla were the first, but everyone does it nowadays.
zaroth 7y ago
> Why doesn't any other manufacturer of cars have a similar problem? Did I miss the story where BMW or Mercedes demand $1200 to replace this part? This particular issue may be unique to Tesla, but obviously other car manufacturers have a whole host of issues which their customers deal with and can result in service bills even staggeringly higher than this. My last Infiniti G35 has an issue with the Bose head unit, where a single resistor would come loose and the radio would lose power when you hit a bump. The problem was the whole center console stack of buttons all were powered through the radio and so you would also lose the ability to change the temperature or turn on the defogger. Cost was $2400 to replace the unit, and they would typically fail again ever few years. The problem was extremely widespread and despite a campaign to get Infiniti to extend the warranty, they never did. I ended up putting in an after-market unit but I had to replace the module with all the climate control buttons as well with one from the Japanese market version of the same car, because that one could work independently from the radio.

yabadabadoes 7y ago

> What's not replaceable or too expensive about a $400 or so nVidia Tegra board in a $100k car? https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/community/lifecycle https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/community/lifecycle Tesla needs to have stock relative to replacement rate purchased before nVidia's last ship date. So if they used eMMC built in to a part like this then they should be raising problems for their parts logistics.

hef19898 7y ago
Wouldn't be surprised if spare parts logistics turn out to be a pain for Tesla.
- lazyjones 7y ago
  Not anymore in this case since they replaced this with their own design. Upgrading older cars should be possible, but is rumoured to be prohibitively expensive for Tesla as the moment, since other components have to be swapped as well.