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I’m always surprised how poor engineering gets exposed in products I purchase being an Arizona resident. No, failing at 122F is not acceptable. If your hardwar
by andrewmcwatters 5y ago
I’m always surprised how poor engineering gets exposed in products I purchase being an Arizona resident.
No, failing at 122F is not acceptable. If your hardware is exposed to outside conditions, it should operate easily below 32F, and well above 140F.
Considering that phones can operate below 0F and near 122F, that’s embarrassingly bad.
Same thing in vehicles. If you’re driving consistently at interstate speeds, you should be able to cool a cabin down below 72F while driving through 120F weather. Too many vehicles fail this, and frankly it’s repulsive for something you buy for 5-6 figures.
- newsclues 5y agoIt’s not a safety issue like car regulation, engineering choices have costs. Just because it doesn’t work in your environment doesn’t mean that it’s not suitable elsewhere and the burden of spec changes for your climate may make the cost go up for people elsewhere who don’t have the same requirements
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- edoceo 5y agoWhy build a product for everyone you're marketing to when you can cheaply build a product that works for some but still sell to all. Caveat Emptor after all. Hit my OKRs for the quarter, I'm going to the pub.
- 8ytecoder 5y agoEh, every design choice is a compromise between multiple variables. The cost has to be reasonable for there to be someone to sell the product to.
- newsclues 5y agoBecause the cost would go up, and marketing becomes harder which makes it harder to get data and revenue to continue engineering.
- edoceo 5y agoGoogle shows me loads of industrial SBC devices that operate from -40 to +85C(!) that are under $200 USD. It's not reasonable for Starlink?
- newsclues 5y agoStarlink dish costs $500, and has an antenna and motor. $500 seems cheap for what it does, and that makes sense if it’s cost optimized but doesn’t have the broadest climate zone tolerance.
- cartoonworld 5y ago* This product is not intended for sale in AZ, NV, NM, TX, Parts of Utah, California, Idaho and the Dakotas in the summer, direct sunlight, and most roofs.
- TchoBeer 5y agoIs it common to have a car on the roof?
- AngryData 5y agoWhere is it suitable then? I expect higher temps on roof of the farthest northern borders of the US.
- 1MachineElf 5y agoInteresting. What phone operates at 0F? A few years ago I was in 15F conditions, the batteries in both my phone and my hiking partner's phone would not work at all. Going out briefly in 0F weather and pulling the phone out of the pocket of a warm jacket might be fine, but I'm doubtful a phone could continue to function when thoroughly cooled to 0F. If there's been a recent shift in phone technology, then I'd like to know more.
- colechristensen 5y agoI’ve only had problems even well below 0F in Minnesota using old phones. It’s just battery chemistry, current capacity and voltage are depressed by low temps. Some phones aren’t engineered very well and regularly pull current near their battery’s capacity which is just poor design.
- xcskier56 5y agoOf course 3/4 of the people responding to how cold can a phone get are from Minnesota. Lolol. Edit: I am also
- xcskier56 5y agoI’ve found this is very much a function of how new/good the battery is. I’ve been out skiing in ~0 degrees for a couple hours with a newer phone and not had trouble and I’ve had the same phone a year or two later go dead after 45min in 20 degree weather. My current iPhone 12 Pro lasted 45 min at -15 this winter and didn’t run out of battery. I keep my phone in an unheated water bottle carrier
- Aerroon 5y agoMy OnePlus One (old, I know) worked just fine this winter. I was able to read on my phone the entire 20 minute walk to the store and back. It's when I got home into the warmth that it would end up rebooting/saying the battery was empty. It's possible that the phone generated enough heat to stay warmer though. The main problem with operating it was actually how cold my hand that's holding the phone gets since it doesn't move like the other hand does. I had to wear double gloves.
- MattGaiser 5y ago122F is 50C. How much of the world actually gets that hot? AZ is currently the hottest place in the world at the moment. Not the upper range. The hottest place. https://www.wx-now.com/Weather/WxExtremes?hottest=true https://www.wx-now.com/Weather/WxExtremes?hottest=true
- mjg59 5y agoAn object in direct sunlight is going to get hotter than the ambient air temperature.
- jcrawfordor 5y agoespecially when it's in direct sunlight sitting above roofing asphalt. Air temps can get up to 150 F without too much trouble on building roofs with a dark material.
- colechristensen 5y agoA sizable portion of the world has reached 45 C or higher. And you have to keep in mind the temperature is measured in particular ways, local temps near dark surfaces can get significantly higher.
- stu2b50 5y agoVery few places have air temperatures that hot, but in most of the US the surface of a metal fixture right under the sun can and will exceed 122F.
- forrestthewoods 5y agoSynthetic turf fields at your local park can get as hot 160 degrees pretty easily.
- beervirus 5y agoA piece of metal sitting in the sun can get that hot pretty easily in lots of places, even if the ambient temperature is much more reasonable.
- 5y ago
- chairmanwow1 5y agoYou live in a desert. I feel like the extremes of your environment are not a useful barometer for a reasonable operating temp.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoI also live in the fifth most populous city in the United States. So, yeah, it is. If anything, you should fully expect, at this point, that how we deal with extreme conditions in Phoenix is a harbinger of what is to come for other parts of the nation.
- jayd16 5y ago>I also live in the fifth most populous city in the United States. So, yeah, it is. But that's still less than half a percent of the US population.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoI guess we should also avoid rust proofing metals since most people don't live by the ocean, too.
- adamcstephens 5y agoJust because lots of people made the same decision doesn’t make it smart or reasonable.
- 5y ago
- turtletontine 5y agoI'd say maybe places where the air temperature regularly gets to >110 F aren't meant for human habitation
- dylan604 5y agoWhat's your definition of "regularly"? You're probably ruling out most of the US southwest. I made the same comment about people living in areas that are routinely >90% humidity, mosquito infested jungles and was totally slammed for it. People moving to those locations are the odd ducks to me. People born and raised there don't have a choice.
- kortex 5y agoReally, it's not "don't live there," as humans have inhabited these conditions for thousands of years. But "don't live there and expect the same standard of living." Contrast living in an adobe house/masonry house with no AC, taking a siesta/riposa in the hottest hours, and tolerating a bit of sweat, vs in-ground pool, AC set to 68, driving around mid-day in a rolling greenhouse.
- pbreit 5y agoIt's a v1 beta. Maybe put it in the shade.
- goodcanadian 5y agoAs a Canadian, 32F seems like an oddly high lower limit to me. Things should operate down to at least -40.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoGreat point. I think this highlights the importance of what we consider acceptable tolerances.
- TchoBeer 5y agofascinating how a post about inclusive design manages to have a blind spot that it does not consider. A wonderful demonstration on why diverse backgrounds in engineering is important.
- onlyrealcuzzo 5y agoAssuming you can keep something in the shade - does anywhere on Earth get to 140F beside inside forest fires, lightning bolts and volcanoes? There is a substantial portion of the worlds population that lives months at a time where temperatures are regularly well below freezing.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoPavement.
- tyingq 5y agoA satellite dish doesn't do super well in the shade :)
- NaturalPhallacy 5y agoDepends on the shade: http://www.dishcamo.com/fabric_dish_cover.htm http://www.dishcamo.com/fabric_dish_cover.htm
- jessaustin 5y agoLine of sight to a satellite is only close to the sun for an hour or two a day, and only in certain locations on earth. It is entirely feasible to shade the rest of the sky.
- nickysielicki 5y agoIt's not trivial to do things at tens of gigahertz at a wide range of temperatures. They didn't engineer it this way because they didn't consider the existence of Arizona, Texas, and Southern California. The thermal limits exist because RF is absurdly difficult. Maybe in 30 years we'll have TCXOs and other RFICs that make it trivial. Right now it's not. tl;dr: Your phone doesn't have radios capable of talking on bands like 10.7–12.7 GHz (X/Ku band) and 37.5–42.5 GHz (Ka/V band)
- murgindrag 5y agoIt's not impossible either. Cheap brute force hack: Have a chip burn power to heat the chip up to a constant temperature. This was done in one of the early precision band-gap references. More expensive brute force hack: Stick a Peltier cooler on the thing, and servo to a well-controlled temperature. Communication equipment is critical to work for emergency use, and coincidentally, emergency use is when you're most likely to see high temperatures. tl;dr: Military equipment is required to operate like this, and has insanely high-performance RF equipment.
- nixgeek 5y agoMilitary BGAN doesn’t get anywhere near this throughput in this package, so the size-performance is quite different there IMO, and isn’t a fair comparison to what Starlink is doing with their terminal.
- nickysielicki 5y agoThe military is not a business with business constraints. If cost and power draw is no concern, then sure, it's possible. Hell, put a little AC unit beside the enclosure. These are CPEs and they're sold at a tremendous loss already (a quick google says a whopping $2500 loss on a $500 price tag!). They won't stay in business long if they burn an extra $500 per device to make it suitable for a couple thousand extra customers.
- sokoloff 5y agoEvery one of their dev teams likely costs more in a year than that $1M increment in BOM costs. I’m not saying it’s a good idea, but it’s probably not going to be a kill the company expense.
- cortesoft 5y ago> No, failing at 122F is not acceptable I don't think it is a simple as saying that. If, for example, it cost twice as much to design something that works up to 140 as it does to make it work up to 122, I don't think it makes sense to make everyone in the world pay twice as much for something they don't need. You should sell a more expensive version that works up to 140.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoThere's a cost to building multiple SKUs. Also you massively overestimate the cost of materials for withstanding such temperatures.
- cortesoft 5y agoSure, but I was replying to your general comment that it is simply unacceptable for something not to be engineered to withstand heat above 122. I think it is a design decision, and the costs and benefits have to be weighed. If the extra cost per unit is more than the lost revenue from not being able to sell to consumers in hight temperature locations, it might make sense not to design it for high temperatures. As long as these limitations are communicated to potential customers, I don’t see a problem with that.
- hnick 5y agoDo air conditioners need special handling over there? When we got ours serviced the guy told me that in Western Sydney the split systems sometimes shut down on the worst days when you need them due to heat in direct sunlight. You need shade, but even then some had sprinkler/misting systems for the hotter days.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoNo, they're built with pretty extreme tolerances. Further, they're often placed on rooftops, so it's by design rather than convenience of the materials used.
- stefan_ 5y agoWe're talking about 122F and exposed to direct sunlight for long durations. So more like 150F inside that thing and then with one stroke you are locked out of using any sort of customer electronics parts or packaging. I'm sure SpaceX will look into it but you might not like the outcome. (And no, most phones will not operate at that temperature for longer than a few minutes)
- Waterluvian 5y agoMaybe they didn't do the math or are planning to improve upon it. But maybe they did do the math and consciously wrote you off.
- Sevii 5y agoMy iPhone starts panicking whenever it runs maps when the temps go over 100F which considering its 115F today is not a good user experience.
- NaturalPhallacy 5y agoThis is literally a record breaking heatwave; https://www.allsides.com/story/western-us-hit-heat-wave-threatening-fires-and-straining-power-grids https://www.allsides.com/story/western-us-hit-heat-wave-thre... 122F is not a normal temperature.
- Johnny555 5y agoSame thing in vehicles. If you’re driving consistently at interstate speeds, you should be able to cool a cabin down below 72F while driving through 120F weather. Too many vehicles fail this, and frankly it’s repulsive for something you buy for 5-6 figures. You're driving what is essentially a greenhouse, I don't want to pay extra for a cooling system that's designed for temperatures up to 150 degrees. Though also I wouldn't pay 6 figures for a car.
- kortex 5y ago> Too many vehicles fail this, and frankly it’s repulsive for something you buy for 5-6 figures. What's repulsive is the way many people live in AZ. Literal hot take: maybe people living in one of the hottest places on Earth shouldn't expect to have the same consumer experience (without modulating their habits). IMHO, AZ is chock full of human hubris. Pools, fountains, water features, grass lawns, and golf courses. Why should people expect to live as if it were Cascadia or New England with water consumption? Same with car performance. Maybe you don't get to have an icy 68°F in your rolling greenhouse behind a 40,000BTU power plant at dead noon in the heckin desert.
- EADGBE 5y agoTo be fair, we’re all environmental parasites no matter where we are on this heckin planet.
- zargon 5y agoI completely agree with you. Though as a Minnesota resident, a 32F low temp operating bound is hilariously ludicrous. "Well below" -20F would be the expectation here. I'm sure Canadians would extend that to well below -40.