[Arm-netbook] arm netbook component pricing

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 10:29 PM, Joakim Seeberg <kontakt at seebergit.dk> wrote:
> Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton skrev:
>> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 3:15 PM, Adam Gill <madallig at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> OK thanks ..... I'm onto them now  ..... there a few electronic shows coming
>>> up in April which I'll be attending  ...... there's a good chance to find
>>> similar or better than CT-PC89e
>>>
>>> And also if i can complete schematics/gerber file/bom for the so-dimm
>>> including all the new features - it won't be too expensive to get a few
>>> proto-types made up at a pcb factory ...
>>>
>>> If we can do that --- making the rest of complete netbook will be easy ...
>>>
>>
>>  i've just sent a message to rms and eben moglen, asking them if
>> they'd like to help in some way to reach people interested in
>> benefitting from an "openpandora-esque" arm netbook project.  the
>> success of the openpandora is not so much the device itself but that a
>> good couple of thousand people were willing to pre-order it and wait
>> for what has now been two years whilst they fiddled about and designed
>> it.  i'd like to short-cut that to only a few months, by using as much
>> pre-designed stuff as possible, with a view to entirely releasing the
>> design files under GPL licenses.
>>
> Hi I've been following this list for a few days and I really like your
> idea and would like to help getting pre-orders.
> To make it possible I think the netbook should at least be as powerful
> as the atom netbooks around today and have a 10" screen.

 the screen absolutely i agree with, and this is easy and achievable
at low cost.  $40 for the screen is achievable in volume; $32 is
achievable in mass-market volume.

  the processor i also agree with... but... it's not going to happen
immediately - it's going to take a good eight to ten months before
something "affordable" crops up in the _remotely_ acceptable region.

the prices escalate rapidly and you price yourself out of the market,
leaving "power consumption" as the only remaining factor to compete
on, and that's not attractive enough to the average person when you're
talking a difference of only between 3-4 and 12-15 watts.

> How is the performance of the netbook your working on now with lxde or
> similar?

 a 667mhz ARM11 S3C6410 is basically too slow ( which is why the
embedded OS, mid-linux, is so crucial).

 considering even an ARM Cortex A8 at 600mhz (e.g. the OMAP 3530) is
struggling.  on an 833mhz ARM Cortex A8, firefox takes a whopping
THIRTY SECONDS to start up, whereas arora, which is qt4 and
webkit-based, takes FOUR.

here's roughly what's been able to be established:

* 667mhz S3C6410 + 256mb DDR1 RAM: $28.  too slow
* 600mhz OMAP3530 + 256mb POP DDR2 RAM: $45.   far too expensive.
* 600mhz OMAP3503 + 256mb POP DDR2 RAM: $29.   far too expensive.
* 720mhz OMAP3530 + 256mb POP DDR2 RAM: $65.   insanely expensive.
* 833mhz S5PC100 + 256mb DDR2 RAM: $23.  good!  tolerable.
* 1ghz S5PV210 + 256mb DDR2 RAM: guesses - $32?  very good!  needs
confirmation though.

i'm _guessing_ that the qualcomm snapdragon 1ghz and the 1ghz S5PV210
are going to be around $24 each.  add approx $8 for 256mb DDR2 RAM,
you have a price around $32.

michelle knows some prices for 1.2ghz Marvell Sheeva CPUs (i believe)
and also maybe for the armada marvells.

but, basically what i want to put together is a simple app which shows
options + prices, and then if there are enough people who "vote" for
that option, thus indicating to us and to everyone else that they will
pay up-front enough to get what they want manufactured, it happens,
simple as that.

so if people _want_ to pay for a more expensive 600mhz OMAP3530 i'm
not going to stand in the way, but something tells me that they'll not
exactly be interested :)

l.