5 ms·

Teardown: DDC Mobile X900

88 points by SanderMak 12y ago

mkesper 12y ago
Resumé: If all you need is a cellphone with no frills and the weight and shape of a Motorola brick phone… the X900 is for you.
- greedy_buffer 12y ago
  No frills?? Dual SIM and TWO keypads!
  - dholowiski 12y ago
    And a 320x240 pixels camera. That's over 70,000 pixels! Imagine how many photos you could fit on a 32gb memory card!
szatkus 12y ago
What a monstrosity! I like it :)
The_Ace 12y ago
I love these Chinese crap phones. The effort spent in order to optimize the system to cut the BOM is truly astonishing.
- joezydeco 12y ago
  Anyone else notice the ribs in the battery cover that were ground down by hand to make the cell fit snugly? https://cdn.sparkfun.com/assets/learn_tutorials/2/5/1/SFE_0046.jpg https://cdn.sparkfun.com/assets/learn_tutorials/2/5/1/SFE_00...
- jdboyd 12y ago
  If it was strictly the BOM they were cutting, I don't think it would have had two keypads.
maaarghk 12y ago
This is genuinely gorgeous. The best bit is the Nokia badge!
Cthulhu_ 12y ago
I can't be the only one that wants a cellphone made out of pot metal.
- chiph 12y ago
  Phone, flashlight, and self-defense tool, all in one!
pling 12y ago
The thing that scares me is that as an EE in a previous life, I've seen worse things come out of one man bespoke engineering companies. One thing that sticks in my mind was a PLC replacement for some old relay logic in a factory. Rather than use a proper PLC, they glued some relays can first down to the bottom of a shielded box with hot snot and drove it with a BASIC stamp soldered to some veroboard. The whole thing packed in one day (duff relay) and I was contracted to fix it. Had to write the entire unit off and start again. This thing was controlling what I can only describe as a giant maiming machine that would kill everyone for several feet if it went wrong. Also one reason why a lot of "maker" contraptions scare the shit out of me. 2cm frim certain death and electrocution a lot of the time.
- voltagex_ 12y ago
  I wouldn't pin it all on the maker community - fake iPhone chargers are just as bad
  - pling 12y ago
    They're not quite as terrible as the recent press makes out. Prior to the hype around this we had nearly 20 years of low quality wall wart switch mode supplies. Very few people got hurt and very few people do today. Even if they completely burn out its a low risk. Conversely my official Lenovo T400 charger has a 90-110v AC potential between its virtual ground and true ground which occasionally gives me a tingly finger. The maker community though have no basic electrical safety knowledge as a whole and are concerned with making it work, not making it work safely.
    - voltagex_ 12y ago
      >The maker community though have no basic electrical safety knowledge as a whole and are concerned with making it work, not making it work safely. Ouch. What are you basing this on? What could be done to improve the situation?
      - pling 12y ago
jng 12y ago
What's the price of the beautiful little monster? It would help complete the awesome picture.
- raphman_ 12y ago
  As mentioned in the blog post's comments, Nate paid ~ 28 USD for this. Another comment links to Alibaba Express, in case you want to buy a similar one: http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Luxury-Mobile-Phone-X900-Flashlight-Loud-Speaker-2-0-Color-Screen-Camera-Bluetooth-MP3-MP4-FM/1262109605.html http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Luxury-Mobile-Phone-X900-Flas...
untothebreach 12y ago
Wow. I had a really shitty commute this morning, and this just made my morning so much better.
userbinator 12y ago
Similarly, here is a $12 phone, again a design with only 2 main ICs, but with far fewer features (although it does have Bluetooth and an ARM...): http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 The mention of "XCPU RISC" in the datasheet led nowhere but RDA's site, and I suspect that it's some sort of MIPS clone. They also have an ARM-based SoC, the RDA8810.
DanBC 12y ago
Here is a teardown of a $7 phone. It "looks a bit like a Nokia". The vendor applied a "Samsung" faceplate because she'd run out of all the others. http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/$7_cell_phone http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/$7_cell_phone
yitchelle 12y ago
Here is a serious question, I wonder if DCC (the phone's company) makes any money from this wonder of electronic enigneering?

88 points by SanderMak 12y ago

Resumé: If all you need is a cellphone with no frills and the weight and shape of a Motorola brick phone… the X900 is for you.

greedy_buffer 12y ago
No frills?? Dual SIM and TWO keypads!
- dholowiski 12y ago
  And a 320x240 pixels camera. That's over 70,000 pixels! Imagine how many photos you could fit on a 32gb memory card!

szatkus 12y ago

What a monstrosity! I like it :)

The_Ace 12y ago

I love these Chinese crap phones. The effort spent in order to optimize the system to cut the BOM is truly astonishing.

joezydeco 12y ago
Anyone else notice the ribs in the battery cover that were ground down by hand to make the cell fit snugly? https://cdn.sparkfun.com/assets/learn_tutorials/2/5/1/SFE_0046.jpg https://cdn.sparkfun.com/assets/learn_tutorials/2/5/1/SFE_00...
jdboyd 12y ago
If it was strictly the BOM they were cutting, I don't think it would have had two keypads.

maaarghk 12y ago

This is genuinely gorgeous. The best bit is the Nokia badge!

Cthulhu_ 12y ago

I can't be the only one that wants a cellphone made out of pot metal.

chiph 12y ago
Phone, flashlight, and self-defense tool, all in one!

pling 12y ago

The thing that scares me is that as an EE in a previous life, I've seen worse things come out of one man bespoke engineering companies. One thing that sticks in my mind was a PLC replacement for some old relay logic in a factory. Rather than use a proper PLC, they glued some relays can first down to the bottom of a shielded box with hot snot and drove it with a BASIC stamp soldered to some veroboard. The whole thing packed in one day (duff relay) and I was contracted to fix it. Had to write the entire unit off and start again. This thing was controlling what I can only describe as a giant maiming machine that would kill everyone for several feet if it went wrong. Also one reason why a lot of "maker" contraptions scare the shit out of me. 2cm frim certain death and electrocution a lot of the time.

voltagex_ 12y ago
I wouldn't pin it all on the maker community - fake iPhone chargers are just as bad
- pling 12y ago
  They're not quite as terrible as the recent press makes out. Prior to the hype around this we had nearly 20 years of low quality wall wart switch mode supplies. Very few people got hurt and very few people do today. Even if they completely burn out its a low risk. Conversely my official Lenovo T400 charger has a 90-110v AC potential between its virtual ground and true ground which occasionally gives me a tingly finger. The maker community though have no basic electrical safety knowledge as a whole and are concerned with making it work, not making it work safely.
  - voltagex_ 12y ago
    >The maker community though have no basic electrical safety knowledge as a whole and are concerned with making it work, not making it work safely. Ouch. What are you basing this on? What could be done to improve the situation?
    - pling 12y ago

jng 12y ago

What's the price of the beautiful little monster? It would help complete the awesome picture.

raphman_ 12y ago
As mentioned in the blog post's comments, Nate paid ~ 28 USD for this. Another comment links to Alibaba Express, in case you want to buy a similar one: http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Luxury-Mobile-Phone-X900-Flashlight-Loud-Speaker-2-0-Color-Screen-Camera-Bluetooth-MP3-MP4-FM/1262109605.html http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Luxury-Mobile-Phone-X900-Flas...

untothebreach 12y ago

Wow. I had a really shitty commute this morning, and this just made my morning so much better.

userbinator 12y ago

Similarly, here is a $12 phone, again a design with only 2 main ICs, but with far fewer features (although it does have Bluetooth and an ARM...): http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 The mention of "XCPU RISC" in the datasheet led nowhere but RDA's site, and I suspect that it's some sort of MIPS clone. They also have an ARM-based SoC, the RDA8810.

DanBC 12y ago

Here is a teardown of a $7 phone. It "looks a bit like a Nokia". The vendor applied a "Samsung" faceplate because she'd run out of all the others. http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/$7_cell_phone http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/$7_cell_phone

yitchelle 12y ago

Here is a serious question, I wonder if DCC (the phone's company) makes any money from this wonder of electronic enigneering?