Stage of GTA03 development?

Helge Hafting helge.hafting at hist.no
Fri Dec 19 11:38:37 CET 2008


Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) wrote:
> On Thu, 18 Dec 2008 16:52:51 +0100 Helge Hafting <helge.hafting at hist.no>
> babbled:

> 
> but more to the point - travel around japan. watch people on holiday (the
> japanese) or watch them when they travel. guess what the camera of choice is
> that they pull out? not their nikon d80 or canon ixus or whatever. it's their
> phone. they are always taking tonnes of photos with their phones. it's probably
> the most used type of camera (if comparing against compact cams + dslr's) by
> quote a margin. and they are happy with it.
> 
Making a good small lens is not a problem, a good small sensor is. 
Japanese tourists may be satisfied, but perhaps they just aren't that 
good photographers. Small-sensor images can be reasonable under ideal 
lighting conditions, but hopeless for most other cases. But then, 
tourists go where the sun is.

> the problem is - if you make it optional it all becomes more expensive as you
> need to have multiple production lines and multiple case designs - in the end
> its CHEAPER to ship a camera for everyone. that's the reality of the embedded
> market.

I see. Well, you can have the same case and just provide a lid for the
camera-shaped hole. If camera for all really is cheaper, consider
putting it on a plug. Users who really don't want (or aren't allowed) a
camera can then remove it themselves without de-soldering or breaking
warranty.

>> And of course, a pop-out camera leaves room that can be used for
>> something else. Such as room for several SD-cards, perhaps even that
>> secondary SIM option. More SDcards is good - one for the OS and one
>> that can be changed with the system running. (Or RAID, for the specially 
>> interested :-) Two SIMs are what business users want - one for
>> private use and one for company use.
> 
> moving parts == bad. prone to failure/break - even at production time as
> testing may say "go" but the part loosens during shipping as its intended to be
> loose/move. it's something makers like to avoid if they can.
>
Something pluggable isn't that bad - we have plugs for USB and
headset anyway. :-) Perhaps a modular phone is too expensive, it'd still 
be nice with a slot for an extra card. No moving parts, just a slot 
similiar to a cheap card reader. And accessible without removing the
battery, so a reboot won't be needed. There are other phones with
such a slot, it sure isn't impossible.

High-speed USB and a fast interface to the card would come in
useful too - the phone used as a card
reader for the pc should match the speed of any other card reader. 
Software would launch quicker too.

Helge Hafting





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