[sdiy] [OT] puzzling EPROM problem

[harry]

More inline

TooManySynths wrote:

> --- harry <harrybissell at prodigy.net> wrote:
> > I'm in the industrial market... where long (abusive)
> > life is very
> > important.
>
> And, where customers think nothing of spending five
> times what an equivalent consumer product would cost.

Once true... alas not anymore. They would kill us for a
nickel.

> > We have not seen any difference in boards that
> > are... and are
> > not socketed as far as reliability.  Service is much
> > easier with
> > sockets.
>
> So you are saying then that you never have to push the
> chips in on socketed boards to fix them?

I've had to repair boards with the chips not inserted properly
in the sockets (bent pin etc...)... but that is a manufacturing
defect... not a bad socket. And I will push on ICs to see that
they ARE properly seated (often not) but I think the "socket
problem" is highly overrated.

In a mil-spec application... where you throw away the board
if its bad (hey you can buy a LOT of boards for the price of
one F-16...) then leave the sockets out.

> I have, even
> with good sockets, granted less often than the cheap
> ones, but often enough that I don't agree with what
> you're saying.  That type of repair is never necessary
> when there isn't a socket. But the point is moot, if
> the product doesn't usually need repair over its
> lifetime, then, any socket is a waste of money.

I try to avoid products that become obsolete before the
warranty expires... otoh i agree this is the way of the
world now. Instead of fixing a TV... we buy a new one.
The circuit is so highly integrated that you HAVE to buy
a new one... when it fails its blown to hell! OTOH it
costs half the price of the older technology. And lasts
maybe half as long... hmmm..... (come in bean counters...)

>
>
> It's a game of odds, a game bean counters are good at.

OOH now you makin' me see red (ink). Bean counters are good
at counting beans and convincing a stockholder that they are making
a pile of money. They will only be there for a short time...so short
term gain is the "gold ring". So skip the long term reliability... I'll
cut costs
50% and the failed units won't come in till year three when I've cashed
out. I'm a hero and the smart stockholders will follow my lead when I
leave town. Arrrgh !!! Yes... they are INDEED good at "odds".  This
is 90% of what is wrong with my country (USA) right now.

>
> >
> > You must use appropriate sockets. The little gold
> > plated screw
> > machined sockets just do not have the retention
> > force needed...and
> > most failed sockets I've seen are this type. Second
> > is the real cheap
> > econo-plastic single leaf sockets... they are worse
> > than BBD's !!!
> >
>
> I agree harry, good sockets work really well, but
> synths are not an industrial product and musicians
> already whine about the price.  It doesn't make sense
> to put expensive sockets in a synthesizer which would
> come close to doubling the parts cost for many
> products. That contributes a SIGNIFICANT amount to the
> retail cost, which musicians wouldn't pay.  Same with
> home computers, video games, or really ANY consumer
> product.

So the musicians get a consumer grade product... which fails at the
gig.  I don't CARE if my TV, or VCR fvcks up... but my instrument
must NEVER fail me.  I vote for sockets because:

They save the PCB in the event of service... often a tech who can
replace
a chip cannot work on a PTH or mulitlayer board...

They lower the cost of repair... Its better to remove a chip for
troubleshooting
than cutting runs, etc...

I want to be able to support the product long after the sale.

I do agree that the current surface mount products are NOT candidates
for sockets... they are candidates for throwing away... usually with the

entire unit... the company you bought it from has been sold and the
product
cannot be supported because all the employees who had any knowledge of
it have been let go.

THANK YOU (in hell) BEAN COUNTERS !!!!

> Cheap sockets would decrease reliablity, so it doesn't
> make sense to manufacturer an inferior product where
> electrical abuse is not a signficant factor.
>
> Quite frankly, I've NEVER had to service ANY of my
> modern synths.  NEVER!!!  Even my "notoriously
> unreliable" K2000 has never needed servicing.
>
> Servicing for consumer products is overrated and a
> fast dying field.  It makes more sense in almost all
> cases to limit servicing of complex consumer products
> to board level repair.

 the qualified service personnel don't exist...

> It just doesn't save the
> consumer money to pay a repair technican $35 to $100+
> an hour to fix a board that can be manufuactured for
> pennies. Surface mount is just a natural extension of
> this.  There isn't any need to make parts that can be
> easily manipulated by a repair technican if you can
> replace the entire board for less than it will cost
> him to turn on the oscope.

It is an issue of philosophy.  I throw away a 3 year old CRT
in a TV... to the landfill... because the power supply has fried
and killed half the chips (you know the integrated flyback powers
everything deal...) Why should I even TRY to find the parts... they
are obsolete by now... so I buy a new one and mr bean counter
gets a sale AGAIN instead of having to wait 10 years....

TV sets pile in a landfill....

> I've worked consumer repair on sevaral fronts.  The
> kinds of consumer products that really benefit from
> service oriented design are things like power amps.
> They experience a lot of electrical abuse. Perhaps
> products with a high mechanical component such as tape
> decks should be designed so the transport can be
> easily unplugged and replaced.  That's a good
> application of sockets because it is something that
> might need to be replaced over the life of the
> product. IC's in those products, not worth the
> trouble, almost all VCR repairs cost half as much as a
> new VCR. I can count the number of times I've had to
> replace an op-amp in a consumer product.
>
> It isn't fair to just say that sockets were eliminated
> because bean counters run companies. Bean counters run
> companies because consumers demand more product for
> less money.  It is, imho, good engineering to consider
> the entire product, not just the techy bits.

Agreed.  Its just that an engineer cannot sleep at night after
making a decision like "fvck 'em if they can't understand that
I've actually done them a favor by making them buy a new one..."
I just can't stand the taste in my mouth...

Besides.. the very same bean counters bitch at ME whenever there
is a problem... they take out 50% of cost but don't understand why
they get 50% of product life. On their economic paper it looks OK... its
just
the physics they aren't getting. They have not (in my industry... not
consumer)
stood up to the customer and said... we DON'T repair these. Fvck you
buy a new one. They take the surface mount boards that were gonna save
them the
big bucks... and ask techs to FIX them.  And they try, bravely until
they lose their
jobs... while being told that they are incompetant.

Sorry its the bean counter who is incompetant. If they need to fix a
product...
(and agree diy-ers we LOVE our synths and will always fix them) they
need
to design so that repair is possible.

I do not fix TV's and VCR's either. I throw them away. Because one is
the same as the next... but is your Arp 2600 the same as todays model
??? Nope!

>
> Everthing from the life of the product to the market
> window for the product SHOULD be factors in the
> engineering phase.  Overdesigned products, imho, are
> simply wasteful and as bad a call as underdesign.
> Computers are an excellent example.  There is ZERO
> need to consider component level servicing in
> consumer, or frankly, even many industrial computer
> designs.  The parts are obsolete in terms of
> performance in such a short amount of time that you
> are far better off to maintain some level of backward
> compatibility so a newer design can work where the old
> design was.  If a board fails, simply throw it in the
> trash and put a new one in.

Again... this is true. Its easier to get a new computer, faster, runs
usually
the same softs... the customer just sees a new box. But synths aren't
like
that.  I did a CD with brand "a" and brand "b" will NOT get the sound,
even
if I try for years to nail it.

>
>
> > I use AMP Diplomate (dual leaf) and have never seen
> > one intermittant
> > yet. I
> > ask all our service techs if they have had a
> > problem... NO.
>
> What's the cost?  I bet my entire paycheck it's
> several hundred if not several thousand times the cost
> of no socket ;), and I bet it's no more reliable.

The sockets I use are $.01 per pin... so its eight to twents cents
each in low quantities. But then you have to insert the devices in
the socket, perhaps a manual operation. OTOH the device never
sees the stress of the wave or reflow solder operation.  Is it
more or less reliable.  Its about a wash I'd say...
(yeah... lets not forget wash...)

>  So
> we come back to the same question, sockets only have
> meaning when the item in question should be serviced.
> Consumers are fickle, they don't wait for products to
> quit to replace them, they just have to be out of
> style.

Is the musician a "consumer" ?  I see the Casio and Yamaha home
models as "consumer" and the Kurtzweil etc as an "industrial" model.

I consider a "good" bean counter the one who brings stability and growth

to the company... NOT the one who slashes 50% of the workforce so that
some greedy owners can have one divident before the other 50% of the
workers
get their walking papers.

And a good engineer is the one who delivers the product the customer
wants
with the reliability THEY would demand from that product and at a price
that
the market can bear.

If the customer does not realize that the slightly more expensive and
more reliable
product is better... then we need to fire the MARKETING department. ;^P

I remember a co-worker / musician say recently that the would NEVER buy
another
Alesis keyboard... because they did not hold up on the road
(unreliable).  Hmmm... where is Alesis now ???

Rant mode off...

H^) harry

>
>
> >
> > OTOH surface mount makes this all moot point.. don't
> > it !!!  ;^(
>
> Yep :)
>
> Daryl
>
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