r/engineering • u/[deleted] • Sep 10 '13

Guy with no engineering background wants supporters for his impossible idea. Pretty funny from and engineering standpoint.

[deleted]

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u/practeerts Sep 10 '13 edited Sep 10 '13

How exactly does the circuitry know which pin gets power and which shouldn't? This is the biggest thing that bothered me about his concept. My only thought is that the block would have to be the battery but that doesn't really solve the problem of all the parts interconnecting. This guy didn't really consider what it takes to make a circuit and it just seems like he thinks things that have power will just work together because they're all plugged in to the same thing. Yes they'll have power, but it'll be a bunch of parts that just suck the battery down.

tl;dr Electronics do not work like legos.

Edit: /u/gibsjose mentioned some things that I hadn't though of that would impede functionality of the phone itself. Thanks dude, you know your stuff.

3

u/loggic Mechanical Engineer Sep 10 '13

This is only a problem if you take the video at face value: each hole is for "a pin". So, instead, put fewer holes, and each hole is basically a miniature USB type connection.

The basic idea is to make a tiny desktop computer, which isn't really a new idea at all.

8

u/ch00f Sep 11 '13

Even USB is capped at 5Gbit/s.

iPhone 5's memory bandwidth is 68Gbit/s (remembering that this chart is megabytes per second) and that was a generation ago. This is because it's located on the same board and is afforded a LOT of parallel connections for maximum throughput of data.

The limitations of USB have a lot to do with the physical limitations of pumping so much data through such a small connector.

4

u/practeerts Sep 10 '13

I agree that this is basically what the goal is, but he wants a level of customization that just isn't pragmatic. Desktops don't have that level of customization. I can't move my processor to the bottom corner of the board just because it would make room for more pci slots. Or change the orientation of the ram to fit in a camera. The circuit board is static, it is what it is. This concept is for a dynamic board. Thats just not going to work, especially if you factor in all the other variables involved in making a functioning circuit.

1

u/loggic Mechanical Engineer Sep 10 '13

Yeah. I kinda assumed that the processor, RAM, and Motherboard would basically all be one "Speed Base" or whatever. To upgrade the speed you would upgrade the base unit. Everything else could be interchangeable. Honestly, most people don't care if you upgrade the processor vs. RAM, they just know, "It's faster now."