Custom graphics card

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
Don't turn this into a fun game, because it looks to you that the sun goes around the earth!

Anyone with enough brain in his head will figure out what he needs to know!

Example: an arduino MCU costs 3 dollars, an Intel MCU costs 300 dollars. They are produced in the same way with the same machines in the same factory type!

And the few miligrams of material inside that are different can not be worth this much!

It takes a person 10 years to buy a car, house, computer, phone and everything he needs to live for the rest of his life under l normal circumstances. He only need to buy food. However since we see its not so now, who puts the extra years of people in his pocket!?
Ah, so no supplier of $0.25 displays? You've really disappointed me.
Well, my kids are finally awake - time to open presents.
 

Thread Starter

ArakelTheDragon

Joined Nov 18, 2016
1,362
Happy Christmas and new year!

Once upon a time people didn't believe that the universe is made of atoms and they persued the one said so with hatred as he could not see an atom!
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
Happy Christmas and new year!

Once upon a time people didn't believe that the universe is made of atoms and they persued the one said so with hatred as he could not see an atom!
Your anger and your rage might be completely justified, but hard evidence will trump even the most passionate anecdotal recitations. My phone cost $37 retail and it meets or exceeds all my requirements. I'd rather play tournament bridge than worry about how to make a better one. Hard to find lower cost recreation these days. I'm still working on seeing a fraction of the

\(_{52}C_{13}\;=\;\frac{52!}{39!13!}\;=\;635,013,559,600\)

possible hands
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
You will have to decide should you believed or not!

Can a moderator please delete this thread, I think it will be better!
Don't hold your breath on that request. I think locking might be appropriate if they decide that the discussion is going nowhere. There are valuable nuggets here. Not every proposal is worth seeing the light of day, but that does not mean that the issues raised are trivial or insignificant. Entrepreneurial activity produces at least 9 bad ideas for starting an enterprise for every 1 that gets funded. This ratio does not discourage the intrepid entrepreneur, it simply motivates him to refine his ideas or his approach until he can light the magic candle. For that reason alone I would argue that others may benefit from the issues we have discussed. That is after all one of the purposes of this forum, at least as long as the cost of mass storage is not an issue which it has not been for more than a decade.
 

Thread Starter

ArakelTheDragon

Joined Nov 18, 2016
1,362
This is not an enterprise. Once upon a time the internet providers decided that they will charge for data, which is the same crap they give you in the rest of the world. In 5 years we had built our own network and everything we needed we were spreading through DC hubs.

My idea is the same. If I can't buy it because some person wants to put my years in his pocket, then I will make it by myself!

The chips industry is something not spoken of! But cause the technology to produce every kind of chip costs 5-7000 dollars. Don't tell me that the machines for 7000 dollars and the few grams of material with which you can produce 20 years make the production of 1 phone 300 dollars. I have been in the trade sector and I am fully aware of the 50 times overpricing!
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
I have been in the trade sector and I am fully aware of the 50 times overpricing!
Please tell me who is selling their products with 50x manufacturing costs! I've never been able to find a company with 98% margins, I need some investments. You have so many ideas and so much knowledge. Please share and help the rest of us get rich with you.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
Please tell me who is selling their products with 50x manufacturing costs! I've never been able to find a company with 98% margins, I need some investments. You have so many ideas and so much knowledge. Please share and help the rest of us get rich with you.
A lifetime of living below my means, saving, and investing have rendered such ideas...uninteresting.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
This is not an enterprise. Once upon a time the internet providers decided that they will charge for data, which is the same crap they give you in the rest of the world. In 5 years we had built our own network and everything we needed we were spreading through DC hubs.

My idea is the same. If I can't buy it because some person wants to put my years in his pocket, then I will make it by myself!

The chips industry is something not spoken of! But cause the technology to produce every kind of chip costs 5-7000 dollars. Don't tell me that the machines for 7000 dollars and the few grams of material with which you can produce 20 years make the production of 1 phone 300 dollars. I have been in the trade sector and I am fully aware of the 50 times overpricing!
Hah! Any effort involving two or more people can be characterized as an enterprise regardless of weather or not an actual company is formed. Any open source software project fits my definition of an enterprise. Another example is the TAPR (Tucson Amateur Packet Radio) group that is trying to come up with an accessible SDR (Software Defined Radio). Just a quick glance at what they have accomplished in the last decade and you see how far behind industry they are for all the predictable reasons.

http://openhpsdr.org/
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
Hah! Any effort involving two or more people can be characterized as an enterprise regardless of weather or not an actual company is formed. Any open source software project fits my definition of an enterprise. Another example is the TAPR (Tucson Amateur Packet Radio) group that is trying to come up with an accessible SDR (Software Defined Radio). Just a quick glance at what they have accomplished in the last decade and you see how far behind industry they are for all the predictable reasons.

http://openhpsdr.org/

But when him and a hundred other guys act as slaves (no pay) to design a video card for the masses, he feels ok about. I don't get it. I also don't get, "why start with a video card?". He'll still have to buy a cpu / motherboard / power supply / RAM memory / chassis / keyboard / mouse / cables from "the man" so he can use it. Then we need to discuss sett8ng up a network where he is not paying "the man".

Good luck.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,979
The era of rolling our own stuff appears to be mostly gone. Surface Mount Technology has raised the bar on the equipment needed to successfully fabricate and assemble a printed circuit board. There are no doubt DIY methods of approaching simple designs with a few chips, but I haven't seen anyone attempt the use of a BGA.
I know several people that have successfully mounted BGA devices using homebrew techniques. I don't know the largest pin count or smallest pitch parts that they have achieved, certainly nothing approaching the state of the art packages.

None-the-less, the basic point you are making is extremely valid. In many areas of electronics, the allure for many people wasn't the electronics, per se, but the desire to have something leading edge (or better) at a fraction of the cost. They then got interested in electronics as they pursued those desires. Those days are definitely over in any meaningful way.

Trying to do something that competes in any way with a modern graphics card seems, to me, to be a fools errand. The performance of today's cards is dependent upon high degrees of integration on cutting edge fab processes that can cost well over a million dollars just to make a mask set.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
From the book of Matthew:

Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's...

Try as we might there is no escape from paying the man. I'm OK with that because if cars were like chips we'd all be driving Porsches for $49.99
Sorta like Economic Thermodynamics
  1. You can't win
  2. You can't break even
  3. You can't get out of the game
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
I know several people that have successfully mounted BGA devices using homebrew techniques. I don't know the largest pin count or smallest pitch parts that they have achieved, certainly nothing approaching the state of the art packages.

None-the-less, the basic point you are making is extremely valid. In many areas of electronics, the allure for many people wasn't the electronics, per se, but the desire to have something leading edge (or better) at a fraction of the cost. They then got interested in electronics as they pursued those desires. Those days are definitely over in any meaningful way.

Trying to do something that competes in any way with a modern graphics card seems, to me, to be a fools errand. The performance of today's cards is dependent upon high degrees of integration on cutting edge fab processes that can cost well over a million dollars just to make a mask set.
Let's take an Analog Devices TigerShark DSP (ADSP-TS201S) as an example, which the datasheet currently lists as OBSOLETE. Ironic that we would be building something that isn't available with obsolete parts thet migh also be unavailable. A purchasing manager's worst nightmare. The chip is a 576-pin BGA, 25 mm^2, with the balls spaced 1 mm apart. The paste has to be applied with extreme precision and the reflow process also has to be precise. I don't know that any of the techs at my former employer were ever able to repair boards with this part, that didn't power up first time from the assembly house.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
4. No freedom at all!

People.are like chained in a dark cave. If you try to bring them out they will.kill you but not listen.
Utopia was the province of the fiction writers of the last century. It never really existed, they just convinced you it was possible, and you are angry about that. A comfortable retirement is freedom enough for me. I don't miss the workaday world even a teeny-tiny bit.

No freedom? Bull Puckey!
At least in this country, a deranged individual can buy an automatic weapon online, and commit mass murder before he can be stopped. Is this not an extraordinary degree of freedom? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? I don't think we can know the answer to that one.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,979
This is not an enterprise. Once upon a time the internet providers decided that they will charge for data, which is the same crap they give you in the rest of the world. In 5 years we had built our own network and everything we needed we were spreading through DC hubs.

My idea is the same. If I can't buy it because some person wants to put my years in his pocket, then I will make it by myself!

The chips industry is something not spoken of! But cause the technology to produce every kind of chip costs 5-7000 dollars. Don't tell me that the machines for 7000 dollars and the few grams of material with which you can produce 20 years make the production of 1 phone 300 dollars. I have been in the trade sector and I am fully aware of the 50 times overpricing!
Please point to where the technology to produce every kind of chip costs only 5-7000 dollars. Show me that and I will start set up a fab before the end of the year.

A modern fab costs billions of dollars to set up.

Even if that weren't the case, the design of a chip with billions of transistors on it doesn't come for free.

How much is an hour of your time worth, including all benefits? How many hours of your time would it take to design all of the subsystems on a modern CPU? How many hours of your time would it take to lay out the circuits for all of those subsystems? How many hours of your time would it take to figure out how to test all of those subsystems? How many hours of your time would it take to actually test the finished die? How many hours of your time would it take to design the boards on which your chip will be used? How many hours of your time would it take to inventory all of those parts? How many hours of your time would it take to market those parts, take the orders, and ship them around the world?
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
Please point to where the technology to produce every kind of chip costs only 5-7000 dollars. Show me that and I will start set up a fab before the end of the year.

A modern fab costs billions of dollars to set up.

Even if that weren't the case, the design of a chip with billions of transistors on it doesn't come for free.

How much is an hour of your time worth, including all benefits? How many hours of your time would it take to design all of the subsystems on a modern CPU? How many hours of your time would it take to lay out the circuits for all of those subsystems? How many hours of your time would it take to figure out how to test all of those subsystems? How many hours of your time would it take to actually test the finished die? How many hours of your time would it take to design the boards on which your chip will be used? How many hours of your time would it take to inventory all of those parts? How many hours of your time would it take to market those parts, take the orders, and ship them around the world?
You certainly have a flair for making a compelling argument to hammer an issue down to the basics. Like most open source and community projects time is the cheapest of all available commodities.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,979
Let's take an Analog Devices TigerShark DSP (ADSP-TS201S) as an example, which the datasheet currently lists as OBSOLETE. Ironic that we would be building something that isn't available with obsolete parts thet migh also be unavailable. A purchasing manager's worst nightmare. The chip is a 576-pin BGA, 25 mm^2, with the balls spaced 1 mm apart. The paste has to be applied with extreme precision and the reflow process also has to be precise. I don't know that any of the techs at my former employer were ever able to repair boards with this part, that didn't power up first time from the assembly house.
I'd be surprised if they were able to repair a board with that part, either. I don't have any feel for the limit of commercial SMD rework stations are with regards to BGA or CSP parts is.

If I had to guess, the handful of DIY people I know that have successfully done this are probably limited to very early generation stuff -- say 50 mil or perhaps 25 mill pitch and maybe a couple hundred pins. And I don't know what their yields are like. The last I talked to any of them about this they said that they developed the ability in part for bragging rights, but also because the number of even modest pin-count parts that are only available in BGA/CSP packaging has meant that they felt it was useful to develop the means to avoid being left too far behind as they continue to due custom development on rapid turn homebrew boards. But they realize that it is a losing battle; for all I know they may have already conceded defeat. If I can remember, I'll try to discuss it with a couple of them at our annual dinner tomorrow (assuming the weather holds and we make it).

For what the TS is dreaming about, he has already long lost the battle. Modern graphics cards would not be possible without the huge parallelism, small size, and high speed that the latest package options (and non-package options involving direct chip on board) allow.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,979
Please tell me who is selling their products with 50x manufacturing costs! I've never been able to find a company with 98% margins, I need some investments. You have so many ideas and so much knowledge. Please share and help the rest of us get rich with you.
I guess it would depend on exactly what is included in "manufacturing costs". Also, to keep it somewhat apples-to-apples, the TS appears to be talking about the price to the end consumer, which generally entails many companies buying parts from other companies, adding value, and selling them on to other companies before it gets to the end consumer.

So I think of the old classic of the two 1/8 W resistors that Radio Shack would sell for $1.19. Those probably well exceeded a 50x markup compared to what it cost to get them off the line. Small LSI chips probably fall in that same category today. Even if a 74HC00 chip were free to make, the supply chain needed to get it to the hobbyist consumer would probably leave it costing about the same that it currently does. The small PIC MCUs may approach that, especially when the end user is a onesy-twosy hobbyist and if "manufacturing costs" only includes the actual costs needed to get a functioning part made in a fully depreciated fab.

But I wholeheartedly agree that any single company having a 98% profit margin on anything that has any market and that any other company could conceivably produce is not going to have that margin for very long.
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
So I think of the old classic of the two 1/8 W resistors that Radio Shack would sell for $1.19. Those probably well exceeded a 50x markup compared to what it cost to get them off the line.
It depends on the stage of the supply chain. It seems the OP is is talking about 2 cents of sand in a silicon wafer to make a one dollar chip.

Your radio shack example, the finished "manufactured part" is a packaged resistor in a consumers bag on the counter next to a cash register. Counting only one raw material is foolish and not a standard to measure whether or not an enterprise is profitable. If it was, we wouldn't be talking nostalgically about Radio Shack -they would still be a profitable enterprise.

Unfortunately, manufacturing costs include, in addition to raw materials also include labor and energy. These threee items, Rams, labor and energy are typcially referred to as variable costs and are proportional to the quantity produced.

Even more unfortunately (especially for radio shack) fixed costs also exist. They can be (commonly are) much higher component in manufacturing costs. Interest on borrowed money, depreciation on assets, taxes, insurance, at the manufacturing location.

A boule of silicon can be converted into a pile of chips quite cheaply. But, doing it without a billion dollar Fab is quite a feat.

Also, a pile of resistors can be sold quite cheaply but, RadioShack couldn't compete with their network of brick and mortar stores when mailorder houses can do it cheaper -without the assets.
 
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