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6 years ahead electronics here means AI ASICs. I thought that was weird, I know Toyota cars have radar and I’m not sure about Teslas. IMO as an armchair observ

by swiley 7y ago

6 years ahead electronics here means AI ASICs. I thought that was weird, I know Toyota cars have radar and I’m not sure about Teslas. IMO as an armchair observer the sensor array is far more interesting than any of this. Personally, if I were to buy another car (and hopefully I don’t have to any time soon) I’d want the processing electronics to be off the shelf not weird custom stuff that’s going to have all kinds of corporate social crap attached to it. Edit: to make it clear, I’m not saying one manufacturer is better than the other. I’m upset about this because it’s (IMO) more of a marketing thing (and maybe a way to have some leverage over 3rd party repair shops) and not really a technical improvement. There’s been a lot of weird social stuff masquerading as technological advancements everywhere. these have resulted in some small groups of people abusing computers to manipulate everyone else and once you recognize that pattern you get very cynical with articles like op.

rusticpenn 7y ago
automotive electronics has a different set of requirements from normal electronics. Most ecus are designed by Bosch, Delphi or some big company in the field.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  Only if you want them to last 20 years - if that's not the expectation of your customers, there is a massive opportunity. Figuring out new ways to eliminate uneconomic quality is an ongoing revolution everywhere.
  - swiley 7y ago
    Yeah that’s why GM has been doing so well.
tyfon 7y ago
Tesla has radar in their cars, at least in my X. I think I read somewhere that the cheapest model 3 does not have it but I can't confirm that.
- xedeon 7y ago
  All Tesla cars have radar, starting with Autopilot V1.
- kozak 7y ago
  So does almost any other modern car (for automatic emergency braking).
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
hwbehrens 7y ago
> the sensor array is far more interesting than any of this. 8 cameras, 12 ultrasonic sensors, and 1 forward-facing radar.[0] [0] https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot
- rasz 7y ago
  all this and they still routinely rear end parked cars
- rootusrootus 7y ago
  Even with all that, it still ping-pongs with some regularity and has trouble with on- and off-ramps. And no top-down camera view, which even a Nissan Rogue has! I'm not bitter, though. I knew what I was getting into when I dropped nearly 60K on this thing. But still, would like them to catch up in some areas they are lagging in.
technofiend 7y ago
After Tesla's recent secondary offering perhaps they'll hire some experts away from the big automakers and build a new line to automaker standards. Teslas built to Japanese or European fit and finish standards with their already ahead and ever improving electronics would (IMHO) be unbeatable.
- usrusr 7y ago
  This has already happened at least once, I wouldn't expect revolutionary change from a repetition.
aguyfromnb 7y ago
>I’m upset about this because it’s (IMO) more of a marketing thing (and maybe a way to have some leverage over 3rd party repair shops) and not really a technical improvement. The number of "tech people" that think Tesla has some chip building advantage over the likes of companies like NVIDIA is astonishing. Tesla's marketing compares their chip to older NVIDIA boards. NVIDIA has better tech available off-the-shelf: https://www.businessinsider.com/nvidia-fires-back-at-tesla-claiming-worlds-best-self-driving-car-chip-2019-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/nvidia-fires-back-at-tesla-c...
- drcross 7y ago
  Perhaps that's the case but Nvidia can't compete in thermal efficiency.
- SEJeff 7y ago
  Where you're defining better as faster, however, it uses enormously more energy, which impacts overall driving range. It doesn't need to be faster past a certain point. They've already got enough bandwidth to run the entire set of self driving neural networks in duplicate at production speed on the current FSD hardware version 3 computer. There is a point of diminishing returns wrt speed and I think we're quickly approaching if not already surpassing it. Now it is down to efficiency, which the Nvidia solution gets utterly spanked by Tesla's computer on. Ever ran CUDA simulations? GPUs always use enormous amounts of power to do anything, but they're incredible at floating point math.
  - usrusr 7y ago
    It that just enormously more energy if it was running in a portable device or is that actually enormously more energy when running off half a metric ton of traction battery? Nvidia has plenty of experience in scaling their chips down to a wide range of performance/energy tradeoffs.
    - SEJeff 7y ago
      And nvidia’s faster neural network solution they say is faster than Tesla’s Chip still uses loads more power than Tesla’s chip does.
perl4ever 7y ago
"I’d want the processing electronics to be off the shelf not weird custom stuff that’s going to have all kinds of corporate social crap attached to it." Off the shelf electronics are mutually exclusive of "all kinds of corporate social crap"? I would think the former is the most expedient way to deliver the latter.
- swiley 7y ago
  That’s my point yes.
erikpukinskis 7y ago
It’s eight cameras, you can’t stream a million cars times 8 cameras at full resolution times 24 hours a day, back to the mothership over 4G. It’d be way too expensive. You need to do your learning on the car and stream back the error component to the mothership.

by swiley 7y ago

rusticpenn 7y ago

automotive electronics has a different set of requirements from normal electronics. Most ecus are designed by Bosch, Delphi or some big company in the field.

perl4ever 7y ago
Only if you want them to last 20 years - if that's not the expectation of your customers, there is a massive opportunity. Figuring out new ways to eliminate uneconomic quality is an ongoing revolution everywhere.
- swiley 7y ago
  Yeah that’s why GM has been doing so well.

tyfon 7y ago

Tesla has radar in their cars, at least in my X. I think I read somewhere that the cheapest model 3 does not have it but I can't confirm that.

xedeon 7y ago
All Tesla cars have radar, starting with Autopilot V1.
kozak 7y ago
So does almost any other modern car (for automatic emergency braking).

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

hwbehrens 7y ago

> the sensor array is far more interesting than any of this. 8 cameras, 12 ultrasonic sensors, and 1 forward-facing radar.[0] [0] https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot

rasz 7y ago
all this and they still routinely rear end parked cars
rootusrootus 7y ago
Even with all that, it still ping-pongs with some regularity and has trouble with on- and off-ramps. And no top-down camera view, which even a Nissan Rogue has! I'm not bitter, though. I knew what I was getting into when I dropped nearly 60K on this thing. But still, would like them to catch up in some areas they are lagging in.

technofiend 7y ago

After Tesla's recent secondary offering perhaps they'll hire some experts away from the big automakers and build a new line to automaker standards. Teslas built to Japanese or European fit and finish standards with their already ahead and ever improving electronics would (IMHO) be unbeatable.

usrusr 7y ago
This has already happened at least once, I wouldn't expect revolutionary change from a repetition.

aguyfromnb 7y ago

>I’m upset about this because it’s (IMO) more of a marketing thing (and maybe a way to have some leverage over 3rd party repair shops) and not really a technical improvement. The number of "tech people" that think Tesla has some chip building advantage over the likes of companies like NVIDIA is astonishing. Tesla's marketing compares their chip to older NVIDIA boards. NVIDIA has better tech available off-the-shelf: https://www.businessinsider.com/nvidia-fires-back-at-tesla-claiming-worlds-best-self-driving-car-chip-2019-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/nvidia-fires-back-at-tesla-c...

drcross 7y ago
Perhaps that's the case but Nvidia can't compete in thermal efficiency.
SEJeff 7y ago
Where you're defining better as faster, however, it uses enormously more energy, which impacts overall driving range. It doesn't need to be faster past a certain point. They've already got enough bandwidth to run the entire set of self driving neural networks in duplicate at production speed on the current FSD hardware version 3 computer. There is a point of diminishing returns wrt speed and I think we're quickly approaching if not already surpassing it. Now it is down to efficiency, which the Nvidia solution gets utterly spanked by Tesla's computer on. Ever ran CUDA simulations? GPUs always use enormous amounts of power to do anything, but they're incredible at floating point math.
- usrusr 7y ago
  It that just enormously more energy if it was running in a portable device or is that actually enormously more energy when running off half a metric ton of traction battery? Nvidia has plenty of experience in scaling their chips down to a wide range of performance/energy tradeoffs.
  - SEJeff 7y ago
    And nvidia’s faster neural network solution they say is faster than Tesla’s Chip still uses loads more power than Tesla’s chip does.

perl4ever 7y ago

"I’d want the processing electronics to be off the shelf not weird custom stuff that’s going to have all kinds of corporate social crap attached to it." Off the shelf electronics are mutually exclusive of "all kinds of corporate social crap"? I would think the former is the most expedient way to deliver the latter.

swiley 7y ago
That’s my point yes.

erikpukinskis 7y ago

It’s eight cameras, you can’t stream a million cars times 8 cameras at full resolution times 24 hours a day, back to the mothership over 4G. It’d be way too expensive. You need to do your learning on the car and stream back the error component to the mothership.