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From: John Navas on 9 Aug 2010 10:02
On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 19:48:44 -0700, in
<4lpu56pr1ka0lutosjn9rnmlpiqmgaasq0(a)4ax.com>, Jeff Liebermann
<jeffl(a)cruzio.com> wrote:

>On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 18:06:15 -0700, John Navas
><spamfilter1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote:

>>Snapdragon (lower case "d") is a notable and relatively rare exception.
>>"Do we go with component Q today (and for the rest of the product life),
>>or wait for component T in two months?" Worse, the longer an arbitrary
>>product cycle (as in the case of Apple), the greater the chance that a
>>cool component won't be available on your arbitrary release cycle.
>
>Not really. I was designing in components with nothing more than a
>science fiction preliminary specification on some key components.
>Betting the company on the ability of a vendor to deliver is quite
>common. Like just in time delivery, such development relys on
>everything coming together and happening almost simultaneously.

Sure, but you're missing my point, that arbitrary and relatively
infrequent release dates greatly limit your ability to have the best
possible components -- you're forced either into taking imprudent risks
(think iPhone 4 antenna) or into being conservative in order to make the
release schedule and living with that conservative choice for an
extended period of time, which exacerbates the lag effect. Many other
companies have fallen into the same trap, even software companies like
Autodesk and Corel. In this context, it's not hard to understand how
antennagate came to happen.

>Apple
>went with Qualcomm Snapdragon for the baseband processor chip because
>nobody else had anything close (that they were willing to sell). Even
>Motorola Droid went with Snapdragon.

As I wrote, Snapdragon is a notable, relatively rare exception.
And there were and are alternatives to Snapdragon.

>>My friends at Motorola tell me current design cycles have been shortened
>>considerably. See <http://goo.gl/lzKY> for example. Also
>><http://www.mpdigest.com/issue/Articles/2007/oct/Agilent/Default.asp>
>>And <http://goo.gl/evVj>. Many more.
>
>Two of those articles are on various design tools. The other is from
>National Semi pushing their power management chipset. I'm sure there
>are many more selling their tools in order to speed up the design
>cycle. Some of them actually work.

Having actually been in the EDA tool business (in top management of one
major firm and as a consultant to another), I can tell you the good EDA
tools work very well indeed, cutting months from both design and testing
cycles, although the best such tools are priced well beyond the budgets
and skills of smaller players, which tends to increase the advantage of
the biggest players. Have you personally used them?

>What has changed since I was playing designer is the elimination of
>the prototype cycle.

Design and testing cycles have also been greatly shortened.

>The devices are just too small and complexicated
>to assemble a prototype by hand. The designers therefore rely on CAD
>tools and simulations to design their devices on the computer, and
>then go directly to a small production run. That also shakes out some
>of the manufacturing bugs at the same. My guess(tm) is without these
>tools, the 2 year iPhone cycle would have been more like 2.5 years.

The advantage is actually considerably greater than that at major firms
like Motorola and Nokia.

>If
>the design cycle is only 2 weeks long, what are they doing for the
>rest of the time. Optimization, cost cutting, bug fixing, meetings,
>production jigs and fixtures, documentation, FCC type certification,
>various safety approvals, packaging, distribution, warehousing, etc.

The best firms have largely eliminated such waste. Have you worked at
any of them? It's part of how Toyota was turning out new designs more
than a year faster than Detroit.

>Incidentally, Apple ordered a mess of CDMA Snapdragon chips from
>Qualcomm. Bring on the Verizon iPhone.
><http://fonefrenzy.com/2010/08/08/apple-submits-cdma-chipset-orders-to-qualcomm-iphone-4-headed-to-verizon/>

No need to traffic in rumors and speculation (that have been wildly
wrong up to now) -- the earliest date for that to happen is known and
not all that soon (not that I personally care much one way or the
other).

--
John

"Assumption is the mother of all screw ups."
[Wethern�s Law of Suspended Judgement]
From: John Navas on 9 Aug 2010 10:14
On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 20:01:17 -0600, in
<nQK7o.64286$0A5.45581(a)newsfe22.iad>, Todd Allcock
<elecconnec(a)AnoOspamL.com> wrote:

>At 08 Aug 2010 11:15:03 -0700 nospam wrote:

>> In article <dort569htld5nn7m8j8juqilmv2sq71a75(a)4ax.com>, John Navas
>> <spamfilter1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote:

>> > You seem to be defining the class as
>> > iPhone 4 and any other phones that exactly match it, of which there
>> > aren't any! ;)
>>
>> so which other phones have a high resolution display, gyroscope, a
>> wealth of excellent third party apps, easy to use high quality video
>> chat that doesn't require third party software (qik and fring suck in
>> comparison), excellent battery life, to name just a few?
>
>So you get to define the category/class based on the hardware Apple
>happened to pack in an iPhone 4? No gyroscope? How about the 3G and
>3GS? No compass? iPhone 2G? And what's a "high-res display?" VGA
>(640x480) and above? That leaves out all iPhones but the 4- the circa
>2004 HTC Universal had a VGA screen.
>
>Why not just define the class as "phones with fruit silkscreened on the
>back whose names start with a lowercase-i" and be done with it?

Amen.

--
John

"Assumption is the mother of all screw ups."
[Wethern�s Law of Suspended Judgement]
From: John Navas on 9 Aug 2010 10:20
On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 22:14:14 -0600, in
<4c5f8097$0$48220$815e3792(a)news.qwest.net>, Ted Nelson <ted(a)rnelson.org>
wrote:

>In article <agmu56h8nf7gc6ol3rthl2drol2abndrvt(a)4ax.com>,
> John Navas <spamfilter1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote:
>
>> >actually, the bumper solved the problem by 100% ---
>>
>> But only for those happy with a bumper, so not 100% overall.
>> I personally don't like the idea of a bumper or skin --
>> my phone (T-Mobile myTouch 3G, aka HTC Magic) doesn't need one,
>> and I prefer to keep it naked in a holster. In other words,
>> count me in the percentage for whom the bumper solves the problem by 0%.
>
>but those already have a built in bumper

What "built in bumper"? It has an internal antenna if that's what you
mean, but there's no bumper on the outside of the handset.

>so what is the difference?

Bulk, fit, finish, ease of carrying it in a holster.

--
John

"Assumption is the mother of all screw ups."
[Wethern�s Law of Suspended Judgement]
From: nospam on 9 Aug 2010 11:29
In article <sdru56d8pmvkfpa230o7ni3lqog8ektoeu(a)4ax.com>, John Navas
<spamfilter1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote:

> >Incidentally, Apple ordered a mess of CDMA Snapdragon chips from
> >Qualcomm. Bring on the Verizon iPhone.
>
> >><http://fonefrenzy.com/2010/08/08/apple-submits-cdma-chipset-orders-to-qualc
> >omm-iphone-4-headed-to-verizon/>
>
> No need to traffic in rumors and speculation (that have been wildly
> wrong up to now) -- the earliest date for that to happen is known and
> not all that soon (not that I personally care much one way or the
> other).

bullshit. the earliest date is *not* known. nobody outside of apple and
at&t knows when the exclusive ends or when a verizon/sprint/t-mobile
iphone will appear.
From: John Navas on 9 Aug 2010 11:39
On Mon, 09 Aug 2010 07:02:17 -0700, in
<sdru56d8pmvkfpa230o7ni3lqog8ektoeu(a)4ax.com>, John Navas
<spamfilter1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote:

>On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 19:48:44 -0700, in
><4lpu56pr1ka0lutosjn9rnmlpiqmgaasq0(a)4ax.com>, Jeff Liebermann
><jeffl(a)cruzio.com> wrote:

>>Incidentally, Apple ordered a mess of CDMA Snapdragon chips from
>>Qualcomm. Bring on the Verizon iPhone.
>><http://fonefrenzy.com/2010/08/08/apple-submits-cdma-chipset-orders-to-qualcomm-iphone-4-headed-to-verizon/>
>
>No need to traffic in rumors and speculation (that have been wildly
>wrong up to now) -- the earliest date for that to happen is known and
>not all that soon (not that I personally care much one way or the
>other).

p.s. I think a CDMA2000 version of the iPad is a more likely first step
into Verizon waters for Apple.

--
John

"Assumption is the mother of all screw ups."
[Wethern�s Law of Suspended Judgement]
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