Thanks to everyone for their inputs on the budgetary costs of the new
CASPER hardware.
I certainly understand that the its best to spread the fixed costs,
NREs etc over a larger production run. What has worked in the past is
to batch different groups' requirements. i expect there'll be future
opportunity to do so. For now I think I have the rough data I need to
propose for funds to get our hands on some new, bigger, faster, CASPER
toys.
Jonathan
On Sep 14, 2008, at 4:46 AM, Jouko Ritakari wrote:
Hi Jonathan,
I don't have exact numbers, but went through the math some six years
ago when we produced the VSIB boards.
A batch of ten boards is a seriously bad idea. In our case the
startup cost was about half of the total cost, we produced one
hundred boards.
Most significant was the cost of the PCBs, producing a small number
costs a lot more. Work for buying components is the same for a small
or large batch, automated assemly line costs maybe 50 to 100 dollars
per hour, you can expect two hours setup time and ten minutes for
every board.
And if you order a lot of boards it's a good idea to have them gold-
plated or stored in protective atmosphere (nitrogen I think),
otherwise they spoil in six months.
Cheers,
Jouko
"Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works.
You do
more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then
you do
something else. The trick is to do something else."
On Sat, 13 Sep 2008, Jonathan Weintroub wrote:
Can someone please advise rough numbers (which one might use in a
funding proposal), for the cost to fabricate, assemble and test
Roach PCBs? Please assume donated FPGAs, or break out their
cost). This application does not not use large volumes, so assume
a run of say 10 boards.
Also, is there a roadmap for compatible ADC boards? In particular
we seem to recall discussion at the workshop of an ADC, with two
input channels *each* capable of sampling at a 2 GSa s^-1 rate,
which connects to a single ZDOC. Is this called iADC2? Has this
been built yet? Is there a rough estimate of cost to fabricate,
assemble and test?
Thanks for any guidance the list can offer.
Regards, Jonathan
