From Greece with love.


EvilDragon

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Well, here I am: Sitting in the plane to Greece on my way trying to solve the case issues once and for all.

In case you didn't follow all the posts with tiny updates I made in the last news thread:
I gave the old company a deadline until January 15th to finish the cases and show that their cases will be 100% working and look good.
If they can't do that, then the moulds will be moved to the new company - and I want to do it while I here in Greece, so I can make sure that it really happens.

I know that they won't be able to finish the 500 transparent cases in time. They had 100 finished around christmas and mentioned they need at least 20 working days for the remaining 400.
And they closed down the company from Dec. 24th to Jan 7th... so yeah, you can do the math.
However, if they REALLY were interested in keeping the job, they'd either find someone who could continue the production during the holidays or at least reply to my mail.
I know from my contact that they didn't even read it before January 7th - even though I sent it to them a few days before the company went on holidays and they KNEW that I'm already mispleaased by the delay.

So yes, I told them I want to move the moulds January 16th and they should finish as many cases as possible - I don't really care about the rest (we can easily produce more transparent ones at the new company).
They probably still want to hold off somehow and try to keep the production here, so we might need to force our way through. I don't really like doing stuff like that, but it won't help.

I'm pretty sure the shoulder buttons still won't work properly for one simple reason: I noticed that the PCB isn't really kept in place inside the case.
The Pandora has some pegs that fix the PCB perfectly in place. Even without the keymat, it cannot move around and is always in the exact same position.
This isn't the case with the current Pyra case: The location of the PCB is basically defined by squeezing it between the keymat, case and metal plate.
This means that the position of the shoulder buttons can move a bit up and down depending on how you assemble it - and that's why it's pure luck if you have working shoulder buttons or not.
That's fine for prototypes, as you have the time to tweak during assembly until everything fits fine, but it's not suited for mass production.

Luckily, we already checked and it's not a hard thing to add: Adding some pegs means drilling holes into the mould (it's inverted), and if we manage to move the moulds on Jan 16th, we might even start fixing that the same day (or the day after).
I'll leave on Friday, so that would give us at least two days to work together on the fixes. I'm also staying the night directly in the house of the junior CEO, so we have plenty of time to discuss things :)

The most important days will be the next two... once the moulds have been moved, I feel a lot better!

So much for the cases - any news with the PCBs?
Well, just one quick thing: As we had some occassional backlight flickering, Nikolaus tried a different chip here (actually, the same we use in the Pandora) and this didn't only fix the flickering but also allows the backlight to be brighter then before. Also, the shutter-effect when lowering brightness below a certain level is gone as well :)

Apart from that, the PCBs are still finished, so nothing happened there :)
I'm not sure whether Nikolaus finished finalizing the BOM and Machine files needed by GC for the population (my main focus was on the cases...), but I'll check back with him.
He's also working on the Pyra Phone (see the thread here: ), which means he has time for that... so I can imagine that everything else is finished already.

Okay, so much for now.
I'll make sure to regularly post updates to this thread while I'm in Greece.

Wish me luck and let's get this thing done :D
 
Thanks for the update evildragon. I wish you luck on the trip and hopefully everything goes as planned.


Sent from my LG-M153 using Tapatalk
 
Seems to me like we're finally getting to the head of the case problems, and I'd have to be quite inventive to imagine further problems of this scope that will stop more units getting out to developers at the very least.

I really didn't expect any news before you'd been in Greece a couple of days, so thanks very much for this update, ED. I really hope things go well when you're there, and people aren't too awkward.

One possible typo though:
They probably still want to hold off somehow and try to keep the production here, so we might need to force our way through. I don't really like doing stuff like that, but it won't help.
It won't help? Why do it then?
 
They probably still want to hold off somehow and try to keep the production here, so we might need to force our way through. I don't really like doing stuff like that, but it won't help.
It won't help? Why do it then?
I read this as saying that no matter how much the people at FormAction wriggle and squirm and prevaricate, it won't make any difference (won't help them) (this time) because EvilDragon _will_ move the moulds this week regardless.
 
I read this as saying that no matter how much the people at FormAction wriggle and squirm and prevaricate, it won't make any difference (won't help them) (this time) because EvilDragon _will_ move the moulds this week regardless.
That's probably the simplest way to clarify this statement, which I still maintain is technically a typo, by adding the word 'them' because in English at least the default case is generally the case of the author. Maybe this works differently in German, I don't know.
 
That's probably the simplest way to clarify this statement, which I still maintain is technically a typo, by adding the word 'them' because in English at least the default case is generally the case of the author. Maybe this works differently in German, I don't know.
Indeed. Grammatically, the "it" that wouldn't help would be the "stuff like that" which presumably refers to whatever EvilDragon meant by "force our way through". But, as you pointed out when you suggested there was a typo, it's not likely that he meant that that wouldn't help.

Actually, when I read that paragraph I imagined him tucking the moulds under one wing and crashing out of there breathing fire. Which might not help either, what with arrests and international incidents and the incineration of sundry personnel -- not to mention the melting of those cases that have already been made.

Fortunately he presumably means to be morally forceful and firm rather than physically so!
 
He's also working on the Pyra Phone (see the thread here: ), which means he has time for that... so I can imagine that everything else is finished already.
What is "Pyra Phone", I cannot see the link. It seems that I missed countless things
 
Shame it's come to this and you have to physically Intervene in the situation, but best of luck with the move ED.

I don't recall hearing issues with lack of pegs but it sounds like you will be well placed to discuss the details at length. Just hope that the new company has capacity to make the most of your time. Really looking forward to reading the next update; I suspect it may be an important one :)
 
Thanks for your honesty, hopefully you may be able to bring a few working cases back with you.
 
The same chip as on the Pandora? One thing I don't like about the Pandora is that even at lowest brightness, it's still too bright for comfortably using it in the dark. Will this also be the case with the Pyra?
 
On my Pandora, i cant controll the Display Brighning Level anymore, : The Keyboard Keys for this ditnt make anything diverent, and the same whit the Brighnes Controlls in the Taskbar, and when i close the Pandora, or Aktivate the Lowpowermode (standbye) the Display is off, but the Backlight of the Display stays on..
The only way to deaktivate the Display Backlight is to shut down the OS, : if the Pandora is completly off, then also the Display Backlight is off..
its also a bit divicult to tell this issue in english..
I can remember i am the Only one whit this issue, so mybe whe have luck and this Chip runs on the Pyra correctly..
If the Chip realy makes the Pyra brighter, than this is a good thing..

Im also locking forward to the next few days, hopefully EvilDragon gets the Mould whitout issues to the new company,
Have a nice week in Greece ED..
 
It won't help? Why do it then?
They way I read it is that the fact, that ED don't like to play the "bad cop" like Bosbeetle said, won't help him - as he probably have to do it anyway.
It doesn't help (at all)/"Es hilft nichts" is a common german saying, to mention when people have to do things they are uncomfortable with, but it's important to do them.
 
Very nice news!
I wish you the best of luck.

I still don't get the company policy of FA. But I guess there are reasons for there behaveor.

I hope, that everything is going to plan.
 
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