Whither open hardware ?

[Dave Ball]

Hi Werner,

Werner Almesberger wrote:
> There are many component choices for future phones. Things to consider 
> when choosing chips include:
<snip>
> - are they available (to us) ?
>   

What's the yard stick for measuring against here?  I.e. are we talking 
about one-off from digikey/farnell, samples direct from the 
manufacturer, or limited-run (couple of hundreds) quantities?

> - what are the integration costs ?
is this things like placement of awkward (small pitch etc.) parts,  
FPC's etc.,  or ancillary parts such as partner chips?

> - do they work as intended ?
>   
Hehehe. :-)

Is the normal route of sourcing via a factory (even for prototypes 
etc.)?  From a few searches it seems that getting hold of some parts 
(i.e. screens / touch layers) is incredibly difficult for one-offs.


Dave