2014 is coming to an end (or has already ended in some regions), so of
course I wish you all a Happy New Year and hope you had a few nice
christmas holidays. 2015 will be an important year for us.
The Pyra will be finished, that's pretty much for sure, and then it's
time to gain a lot of interest for it. The interest will determine
whether it'll be actually produced or not - but I'm pretty positive we
can do that :)
But first - the last update of this year :)
1. The PCBs
-----------
Nikolaus completely finished the main PCB just before christmas and the
PCBs have already been ordered! So we'll soon have some fully working
prototype PCBs. He also designed an adapter so we can plug in the
devboard as CPU board replacement, which allows us to fully test all
functions of the mainboard. So the only remaining PCB left is the CPU
PCB. That will need about 100 workhours to be finished, and then the
hardware is basically fully done (except for bugs we may find).
2. The Case
-----------
Not much else has happened since the last post, but it was christmas
time, so every company had some holidays. I expect more information in
January. I might make another trip to Greece as well to talk with them
about the last tweaks if need be.
So, Happy New Year to all of you - see you soon!
Discuss about that post and view the pictures on the webboards:
http://boards.openpandora.org/topic/17548-welcome-to-the-decisive-year/
Follow me on twitter for short news inbetween:
https://twitter.com/EvilDragon1717
Whew, I can't understand so much time has passed again already since I
did any newspost - time sure flies when you got a lot of work to do!
So, anyways, here's today's update... I hope I don't forget anything,
as there's plenty to tell you.
1. The Nubs
-----------
Well, as mentioned last time:
We'll order a bit more than 10,000 of the current Nubs so we got enough
for the first 5000 Pyras.
After that, we can either use the smaller ones, have high enough order
quantities that the current nubs are being produced again or find
someone else to produce them (as mentioned, it's basically just a
magnet that moves around - no electronics inside).
If the first 5000 Pyras sell fast, we can easily order high enough
quantities of the nubs to continue their production.
If they sell slower, we've got plenty of time to find a replacement
So either way, we'll find a solution after that.
One good thing: The smaller nub would fit out of the box - the height
form of the pin is EXACTLY the same - so the case wouldn't need to be
modified if we'd use that.
(You can see that in the pictures at the forum post (link at the bottom
of the mail))
I'll test the small one myself on Tuesday, but I don't think we'd want
that - the travel distance really is too small.
2. A puzzling experience
------------------------
The PCB layout was actually more work than Nikolaus expected.
A LOT more work. Keeping the PCB down to four layers and fitting
everything into the small space of the PCB is a complex puzzle.
Nevertheless, each day, less issues are left. And he's still positive
that we can get finished, unpopulated PCB just before christmas.
This means though that we won't get a populated one before christmas
(unless GC wants to work on December 24th, but I doubt that), but
shortly after christmas.
Still a huge step - and still the most complicated thing in the whole
Pyra-Creation process.
After that, it's time to layout the CPU PCB - but that's easy compared
to the mainboard, as there's more space (and layers), so that should
work out a lot faster.
Want an example of the puzzles Nikolaus has to work on each day?
Here you go:
(Again, picture is at the forum post)
Inside of that picture are at least 3 major and 8 small rule
infringements. If we keep it like that, the PCB could not be produced
reliably, would get shortcircuits or similar issues.
Moving traces around could lead to other rule infringements - so this
is quite a puzzle (high-level Sokoban, eh?)
Each issue needs about 5 - 30 minutes to solve, so it's possible, just
takes a loooot of time.
And the more you solve, the more complicated it gets for the remaining
ones... fun.
Someone should create a puzzle game on the Pandora based on that :D
3. The case
-----------
According to the case designer, I should receive the case design files
with all requested changes tomorrow.
I won't believe it until I get it (as it usually ALWAYS takes longer
than expected), but it shouldn't take much longer.
The battery we'll use will probably be a bit wider than the Pandora
one, so the case needs a bit of a change here.
The Stylus will probably get a tiny bit thinner and all four screws
will be hidden inside the battery compartment (which is nice).
With a small adapter you can also use a Pandora battery, which is great
as well.
I should get two different versions of the case with different shoulder
button designs.
I'll let you know and show you renderings once I get the design files,
that's for sure :)
4. AC Adaptor and LCD Cables
----------------------------
Fatih is looking for various AC Adaptors. Basically, it's a normal USB
plug (with 2A) with replaceable plug, similar to the Pandora (so it
works with EU, UK, US and AU plugs).
There are various manufacturers for that and we'll get different
samples for testing.
The LCD Cable design has been finished as well and Fatih is getting a
quotation for it.
Each trace is wider than on Pandora's cable, the traces are redundant
and there's a bit more space to the edge. Also, all edges are rounded -
which prevents tears directly at the edges (which was an issue with a
lot of broken Pandora cables as well).
The cable also doesn't have any electronics on, so it will be a LOT
cheaper (Pandora's cable was 10 EUR production cost each).
These enhancements should reduce the risk of breaking LCD cables to a
minimum (of course, you can never reduce that to 0 - everything can
break in the world).
5. Software
-----------
We now added key signing to our repository, tweaked the scripts a bit
more and are now able to create working rootfs to our likings.
If anyone got an OMAP5 devboard: I'll post a link and instructions on
how to install it soon, so anyone with a devboard can try it out and
help us improving the default setup and tools.
I THINK that's all for now - but as mentioned, so much happened, so I
might've forgotten something - but feel free to ask me if you have any
other questions.
Discuss about that post and view the pictures on the webboards:
http://boards.openpandora.org/topic/17476-the-pyra-puzzle/
Follow me on twitter for short news inbetween:
https://twitter.com/EvilDragon1717
