[Arm-netbook] Vero Apparatus: Another Arm Laptop Project

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Thu, Aug 13, 2015 at 12:56 PM, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton
<lkcl at lkcl.net> wrote:

> (11) if the battery's not available, have you considered that you
> would need to reverse-engineer the battery casework to create a
> replacement?

 i just thought of another one that's really quite important:

 (12) the connectors are very specific heights and very specific
dimensions.  USB connectors - especially laptop ones - are incredibly
varied.  can you get *EXACTLY* the right connectors (all of them) that
will fit in *EXACTLY* the right places?

 USB ports, VGA port, HDMI port (if there is one), headphone socket....

 all of these you have to source *exactly* the right part... and i can
tell you right now that even a patient and experienced china sourcing
agent - given that these parts are simply not properly listed on any
web site (it's all word-of-mouth) - is going to need paying, for the
quantities involved.

 if you cannot find even just one of the connectors, you will need to
consider cutting holes in the casework.  or re-using an existing hole
which was not intended for the purpose, and creating a
filler-backplate.

 ... so can you see, wookie, why it sounds really attractive,
initially, to only make a small run of custom PCBs to retro-fit an
existing case, but when you get down to the details, the risk of
failure to complete just keeps going up and up.

 if you were doing just the one, as a "hack" a la "labour of love",
i'd say "yeah go for it".  it wouldn't matter if the connectors were
sticking out wrong (or at all), or were resin-glued into place... but
100 or more?

l.