Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
I agree that it would be impossible for anyone to make this device such that it *never* had to be replaced... But I imagine that it is still quite possible to reduce the amount of churn. The real problem is more political than it is technical, however, and that's where I expect the most hurdles. *ASB **http://XeeMe.com/AndrewBaker* http://xeeme.com/AndrewBaker* **Providing Virtual CIO Services (IT Operations Information Security) for the SMB market…*** On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 8:42 PM, Ken Schaefer k...@kj.net.au wrote: Whilst it's relatively easy for a current product to be backwards compatible with older integration mechanisms (i.e. supporting IDE ports, or PCI slots), I haven't seen much in the way of current products allowing new integration mechanisms to be added. I think that's Michael's point - eventually a new port or bus (e.g. USB v4 or PCIe v10) will come along. It will have different power requirements, or will have such bandwidth that it'll overwhelm the CPU/memory or other components of the system etc, so even if you could somehow retrofit the new bus (and thus get access to the new components attached to it), you'd need to replace your whole phone anyway. Cheers Ken -Original Message- From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Ben Scott Sent: Tuesday, 24 September 2013 10:28 AM To: ntsysadm@lists.myitforum.com Subject: Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 7:56 PM, Michael B. Smith mich...@smithcons.com wrote: However, let us remember, the original IBM PC. IBM published all the info and there were many copies. However, the original BUS design was crap. Eventually, that caused a re-design of the entire PC (leaving out a lot of history there, but true nonetheless). Right, but some of the history you leave out is significant. During the times of transition, it was common to have more than one interface type in a system. ISA and EISA co-existed, ISA and VLB co-existed, ISA and PCI co-existed, PCI and PCIe co-existed. One saw PCI, ISA, and VLB on the same mobo. Checking now, I find boards with PCIe, PCI, and ISA slots.[1] At no point did everything need to be thrown away. There was no flag day.[3] If we want to posit the modular phone, we might posit such an upgrade path there, too.[4] Now, durability of the interconnect, that might be a bigger problem. Phones get beat up a lot more than most modular connectors. Another technical issue is that antennas need to be of certain sizes and shapes to work properly. You can't just have a tiny block for an antenna and get good performance. -- Ben [1] Dang ISA just won't die.[2] [2] There's a reason for this beyond the usual legacy inertia. ISA is basically just most of the 8086 CPU pins brought to a card edge connector, which makes it cheap and easy to hook into, as long as you can live with the limitations. [3] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/F/flag-day.html [4] We have to speculate, as absolutely no technical information is provided on Phonebloks.[5] [5] I strongly suspect technical detail simply doesn't exist, and the whole thing was dreamed up by someone as a neat concept, but without much understanding of the engineering needed.
RE: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
Another technical issue is that antennas need to be of certain sizes and shapes to work properly. You can't just have a tiny block for an antenna and get good performance Ah, but that's the beauty that fractal math adds to science. That's why no more whip/stick antennas, they're all internal fractal designs -Original Message- From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Ben Scott Sent: Monday, September 23, 2013 8:28 PM To: ntsysadm@lists.myitforum.com Subject: Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 7:56 PM, Michael B. Smith mich...@smithcons.com wrote: However, let us remember, the original IBM PC. IBM published all the info and there were many copies. However, the original BUS design was crap. Eventually, that caused a re-design of the entire PC (leaving out a lot of history there, but true nonetheless). Right, but some of the history you leave out is significant. During the times of transition, it was common to have more than one interface type in a system. ISA and EISA co-existed, ISA and VLB co-existed, ISA and PCI co-existed, PCI and PCIe co-existed. One saw PCI, ISA, and VLB on the same mobo. Checking now, I find boards with PCIe, PCI, and ISA slots.[1] At no point did everything need to be thrown away. There was no flag day.[3] If we want to posit the modular phone, we might posit such an upgrade path there, too.[4] Now, durability of the interconnect, that might be a bigger problem. Phones get beat up a lot more than most modular connectors. Another technical issue is that antennas need to be of certain sizes and shapes to work properly. You can't just have a tiny block for an antenna and get good performance. -- Ben [1] Dang ISA just won't die.[2] [2] There's a reason for this beyond the usual legacy inertia. ISA is basically just most of the 8086 CPU pins brought to a card edge connector, which makes it cheap and easy to hook into, as long as you can live with the limitations. [3] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/F/flag-day.html [4] We have to speculate, as absolutely no technical information is provided on Phonebloks.[5] [5] I strongly suspect technical detail simply doesn't exist, and the whole thing was dreamed up by someone as a neat concept, but without much understanding of the engineering needed.
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 8:42 PM, Ken Schaefer k...@kj.net.au wrote: Whilst it's relatively easy for a current product to be backwards compatible with older integration mechanisms (i.e. supporting IDE ports, or PCI slots), I haven't seen much in the way of current products allowing new integration mechanisms to be added. Interfaces which are both backwards and forwards compatible are certainly possible. Ethernet is prolly the best example. Parallel SCSI is another. Even in the case of something like an expansion slot, if you allow for future expansion in the design, that can work. For example, I used to work for a company that made network gear. Their top-end switch used modular cards. The first generation only used part of the space on the backplane. The second generation interface used a different space. Both interfaces could be present on a card. A card could then plug into a first generation backplane, and use only the first generation interface, or plug into a second generation backplane and run at the faster speed (or even use both). I think that's Michael's point - eventually a new port or bus (e.g. USB v4 or PCIe v10) will come along. It certainly may occur that at some point, one reaches the limit of one's future planning, and has to break compatibility. Again, look to Ethernet: We seem to be approaching the limits of what UTP can do. But we've gotten at least 3 decades out of it. If we got even 10 years out of a modular phone platform, that would be a huge improvement over what we have now. -- Ben
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 8:48 AM, Erik Goldoff egold...@gmail.com wrote: Ah, but that's the beauty that fractal math adds to science. That's why no more whip/stick antennas, they're all internal fractal designs I know very little about antenna theory, but I know they're still putting relatively large[1] metal loops into at least some phones, to act as antennas. Smaller than the stick-out-antennas of old, but still larger than the modules pictured in the PhoneBlox sketches. Perhaps there are alternative antenna designs which could do the job, but I'm curious why they're not being used already. Cost or complexity, perhaps? -- Ben [1] As in, about the size of the phone.
RE: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
I don't know any 10BaseT ports that are upgradeable to 100BaseT or 1000BaseT. Even if they were, somehow, upgradeable (e.g. via a firmware update), do you think that all the other systems connected to that network connection (CPU, memory, storage etc.) would be capable to taking advantage of the vast increase in bandwidth? Even if they were, would the battery technology of the time be capable of supplying a non-trivial amount of power? I suspect not. So, you end up replacing everything anyway. Cheers Ken -Original Message- From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Ben Scott Sent: Wednesday, 25 September 2013 3:01 AM To: ntsysadm@lists.myitforum.com Subject: Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 8:42 PM, Ken Schaefer k...@kj.net.au wrote: I think that's Michael's point - eventually a new port or bus (e.g. USB v4 or PCIe v10) will come along. It certainly may occur that at some point, one reaches the limit of one's future planning, and has to break compatibility. Again, look to Ethernet: We seem to be approaching the limits of what UTP can do. But we've gotten at least 3 decades out of it. If we got even 10 years out of a modular phone platform, that would be a huge improvement over what we have now. -- Ben
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 7:26 PM, Ken Schaefer k...@kj.net.au wrote: I don't know any 10BaseT ports that are upgradeable to 100BaseT or 1000BaseT. They're not upgradable. They're backwards and forwards compatible. If I plug my PC with the gigabit NIC into my 20 year old 10 megabit repeater[1], I will get a link at 10 megabits per second, and data will flow. If I could find something to install my 3C503 card into, I could connect that to a brand-new 10GBASE-T switch, and it would link at 10 megabits per second, and data will flow. Even if they were, somehow, upgradeable (e.g. via a firmware update) ... It's not about making old components somehow upgrade into new components. It's about preserving the ability for old components to still work with new components. The case in point is a cell phone. You've seen the PhoneBlox concept sketch. For the sake of discussion, let's pretend any other technical, political, and economic challenges doesn't exist. The only challenge is designing an interconnect for the PhoneBlox components. So: While there are plenty of people who feel a heart-felt need to upgrade to the latest toy, there are plenty of others who either just want the dang thing to work, or want to tinker. It's those latter two groups that PhoneBlox is targeting. If the camera, or the card reader, or the wifi radio, or whatever, breaks, we currently have to throw the entire phone out. PhoneBlox wants to make it so you can just replace the broken component. This doesn't need *any* performance change. There are people who actually *don't* want a camera in their phone. There are others who want a better camera. You don't need a ton of new bandwidth to make a camera work. Even decades-old 100 megabit Ethernet can transfer a multi-megapixel image in a second. There are people who want to increase storage capacity because they have a lot of music/videos -- not because they want to access them all at once. They don't need more bandwidth. Or maybe they want a second SD card slot. Or maybe they want a USB port. Or stereo speakers. Or a hard keyboard. These are not high-performance items. We're not talking enterprise database servers, here. We're talking about a phone. It's okay if it doesn't wring every last ounce of performance possible out of the hardware. Even if they were, would the battery technology of the time be capable of supplying a non-trivial amount of power? Battery tech doesn't generally change radically. There are evolutionary improvements, but no revolutionary ones. For the most part, a battery of a given size provides *roughly* the same amount of power that it did five years ago. -- Ben [1] Doesn't everyone have one? It also has a 10BASE2 BNC connector. You never know when you might need that.
RE: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
Awesome idea? - Absolutely! Vendor support in today's disposable world? - No Regards, Don Guyer Catholic Health East - Information Technology Enterprise Directory Messaging Services 3805 West Chester Pike, Suite 100, Newtown Square, Pa 19073 email: dgu...@che.orgmailto:dgu...@che.org Office: 610.550.3595 | Mobile: 610.955.6528 | Fax: 610.271.9440 For immediate assistance, please open a Service Desk ticket or call the helpdesk @ 610-492-3839. [cid:image001.jpg@01CEB848.8BD10310] From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Andrew S. Baker Sent: Friday, September 20, 2013 1:44 PM Subject: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone Phonebloks - http://www.phonebloks.com/ Frankly, this is an idea whose time has arrived. I would absolutely support this if it were available (and I'm lending social media support to it now). Will the vendors support it, though? What say you? ASB http://XeeMe.com/AndrewBakerhttp://xeeme.com/AndrewBaker Providing Virtual CIO Services (IT Operations Information Security) for the SMB market... Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail, including any attachments is the property of Catholic Health East and is intended for the sole use of the intended recipient(s). It may contain information that is privileged and confidential. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete this message, and reply to the sender regarding the error in a separate email. inline: image001.jpg
RE: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
I am unconvinced. It can work, for some period of time. However, let us remember, the original IBM PC. IBM published all the info and there were many copies. However, the original BUS design was crap. Eventually, that caused a re-design of the entire PC (leaving out a lot of history there, but true nonetheless). I suspect the same thing would happen here. OK, for a couple of years. But after that - the PLATFORM has to be upgraded. All IMHO. YMMV. From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Guyer, Don Sent: Monday, September 23, 2013 10:35 AM To: ntsysadm@lists.myitforum.com Subject: RE: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone Awesome idea? - Absolutely! Vendor support in today's disposable world? - No Regards, Don Guyer Catholic Health East - Information Technology Enterprise Directory Messaging Services 3805 West Chester Pike, Suite 100, Newtown Square, Pa 19073 email: dgu...@che.orgmailto:dgu...@che.org Office: 610.550.3595 | Mobile: 610.955.6528 | Fax: 610.271.9440 For immediate assistance, please open a Service Desk ticket or call the helpdesk @ 610-492-3839. [Description: Description: Description: Description: InfoService-Logo240] From: listsad...@lists.myitforum.commailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com [mailto:listsad...@lists.myitforum.com] On Behalf Of Andrew S. Baker Sent: Friday, September 20, 2013 1:44 PM Subject: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone Phonebloks - http://www.phonebloks.com/ Frankly, this is an idea whose time has arrived. I would absolutely support this if it were available (and I'm lending social media support to it now). Will the vendors support it, though? What say you? ASB http://XeeMe.com/AndrewBakerhttp://xeeme.com/AndrewBaker Providing Virtual CIO Services (IT Operations Information Security) for the SMB market... Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail, including any attachments is the property of Catholic Health East and is intended for the sole use of the intended recipient(s). It may contain information that is privileged and confidential. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete this message, and reply to the sender regarding the error in a separate email. inline: image001.jpg
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 7:56 PM, Michael B. Smith mich...@smithcons.com wrote: However, let us remember, the original IBM PC. IBM published all the info and there were many copies. However, the original BUS design was crap. Eventually, that caused a re-design of the entire PC (leaving out a lot of history there, but true nonetheless). Right, but some of the history you leave out is significant. During the times of transition, it was common to have more than one interface type in a system. ISA and EISA co-existed, ISA and VLB co-existed, ISA and PCI co-existed, PCI and PCIe co-existed. One saw PCI, ISA, and VLB on the same mobo. Checking now, I find boards with PCIe, PCI, and ISA slots.[1] At no point did everything need to be thrown away. There was no flag day.[3] If we want to posit the modular phone, we might posit such an upgrade path there, too.[4] Now, durability of the interconnect, that might be a bigger problem. Phones get beat up a lot more than most modular connectors. Another technical issue is that antennas need to be of certain sizes and shapes to work properly. You can't just have a tiny block for an antenna and get good performance. -- Ben [1] Dang ISA just won't die.[2] [2] There's a reason for this beyond the usual legacy inertia. ISA is basically just most of the 8086 CPU pins brought to a card edge connector, which makes it cheap and easy to hook into, as long as you can live with the limitations. [3] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/F/flag-day.html [4] We have to speculate, as absolutely no technical information is provided on Phonebloks.[5] [5] I strongly suspect technical detail simply doesn't exist, and the whole thing was dreamed up by someone as a neat concept, but without much understanding of the engineering needed.
[NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
*Phonebloks* - http://www.phonebloks.com/ Frankly, this is an idea whose time has arrived. I would absolutely support this if it were available (and I'm lending social media support to it now). Will the vendors support it, though? What say you? *ASB **http://XeeMe.com/AndrewBaker* http://xeeme.com/AndrewBaker* **Providing Virtual CIO Services (IT Operations Information Security) for the SMB market…***
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 1:43 PM, Andrew S. Baker asbz...@gmail.com wrote: Phonebloks - http://www.phonebloks.com/ Yah, initially, Android tried to do the modular software, empower-the-user approach. Turns out the carriers really do *not* want that. And in the US, at least, the wireless carriers pretty much own things. We're not customers, we're subjects. Also, the success of the iPhone demonstrates that a lot of people don't *want* choice; they want someone else to do their thinking for them. The entire computing world is heading towards sealed, integrated boxes. I'm not saying it's impossible. Just that the odds aren't good. Personally, I'm all for it. I just don't think it will happen. -- Ben
Re: [NTSysADM] OT: A completely modular phone
* The entire computing world is heading towards sealed, integrated boxes. * T hat's because the non-techie portion of the planet is huge, has all the characteristics you outlined above, and holds tons of disposable cash... *Personally, I'm all for it. I just don't think it will happen.* That is my fear as well... *ASB **http://XeeMe.com/AndrewBaker* http://xeeme.com/AndrewBaker* **Providing Virtual CIO Services (IT Operations Information Security) for the SMB market…*** On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 1:50 PM, Ben Scott mailvor...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 1:43 PM, Andrew S. Baker asbz...@gmail.com wrote: Phonebloks - http://www.phonebloks.com/ Yah, initially, Android tried to do the modular software, empower-the-user approach. Turns out the carriers really do *not* want that. And in the US, at least, the wireless carriers pretty much own things. We're not customers, we're subjects. Also, the success of the iPhone demonstrates that a lot of people don't *want* choice; they want someone else to do their thinking for them. The entire computing world is heading towards sealed, integrated boxes. I'm not saying it's impossible. Just that the odds aren't good. Personally, I'm all for it. I just don't think it will happen. -- Ben
