[HN Gopher] BGA socket allows RAM upgrades on SBCs
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BGA socket allows RAM upgrades on SBCs
Author : zdw
Score : 21 points
Date : 2022-04-21 14:49 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.cnx-software.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.cnx-software.com)
| Syonyk wrote:
| > _While it looks neat, I'm not convinced we'll see barebone
| single board computers where users can insert their own eMMC
| flash and RAM any time soon, since it would likely add to the
| overall costs. A more likely use would be for board vendors
| wanting to test RAM chips from various vendors and of different
| capacities._
|
| Most SBCs use socketed eMMC chips available in various
| capacities. Pine64 and Odroid's eMMCs are compatible, at least,
| and live on a tiny little board you can swap out.
|
| I don't see the cost and complexity as being worth it, though.
| Just stuff the things full of RAM, have lower capacity options,
| and solder it - same as we see today. Yes, it's nice on paper to
| swap the RAM out, but I guarantee these sockets aren't cheap, and
| for something that's used once or twice, eh. Not worth the
| hassle...
|
| I like things that are easily repaired, but I also don't see a
| huge wave of ARM SBC RAM failures. They're already repairable, it
| just requires hot air rework and a bit more skill than swapping a
| DIMM.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| "They're already repairable, it just requires hot air rework
| and a bit more skill than swapping a DIMM."
|
| Where do I find people who can do that?
|
| I google 'electronics repair London' and all I get are little
| shops where a dude with a screwdriver might replace a RAM
| stick, which I can do myself too! If I search for 'hot air
| rework' I get people trying to sell me kit. If an engineer
| can't find a place for such repair in the largest megacity on
| the continent, what hope is there for an average Joe?
|
| Also for chromebooks and crapbook worth $200-$300, how is that
| rare person going to charge for his time?
| GrantZvolsky wrote:
| Sorin[1] is based in some London repair shop. It is probably
| viable because he repairs cheap laptops among other things.
| He also takes mail orders, but I haven't seen him mention any
| contact info in his videos.
|
| [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBYpyI6OW64
| varispeed wrote:
| It's probably not viable as business. You can buy a rework
| station for under PS100 these days and it does not take up a
| lot space, so you could store it away in the storage among
| other tools needed but rarely used. I mean, for instance, my
| dad was never into electronics, but we had a soldering iron
| at home, just in case a wire needs to be redone etc. Times
| have changed and I see no reason why there shouldn't be a
| rework station in every home. Maybe the name "rework station"
| sounds misleading, like you would need a dedicated bedroom to
| use it... But to redo a couple of chips is no different than
| taking your blender from under the stairs to do a smoothie.
| imtringued wrote:
| I'm sorry but searching 'hot air rework bga' leads to better
| results...
|
| https://youtu.be/i9qC7x5QHIo?t=221
|
| Don't forget that you must replace the solder balls on
| desoldered chips with a stencil. Your new bga chip should
| come with solder balls though.
| sokoloff wrote:
| Your last point explains your former difficulty. There's no
| retail willingness to pay, but a lot of willingness to
| inquire and waste someone's time. Start with an in-country
| PCBA firm; they're likely to have someone or know someone.
|
| Alternatively, inquire on an enthusiast forum (eevblog) or
| talk to your local Ham radio club.
|
| The same reason no one is advertising this skill to retail
| buyers of $200 electronics is the reason to not include a
| spurious $2-4 socket.
| duskwuff wrote:
| $2-4? If only. This socket is more like $50-60 -- probably
| more expensive than the rest of the board.
|
| https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001841972537.html
| sokoloff wrote:
| What would a (much more complicated) LGA 1200 socket cost
| if it wasn't already a high-volume part? I can buy one
| for $85 and they'll throw it in a retail box with a whole
| motherboard, multiple PCIe, DRAM, DisplayPort/HDMI/VGA
| connectors, Ethernet and USB controllers, as well.
| Syonyk wrote:
| > _Where do I find people who can do that?_
|
| Your local hackerspace/makerspace is likely to have people
| who can do it, though I don't know how you'd find people who
| do it professionally. It's a bit of a weird niche, though as
| the supply chains continue to crumble I expect it to become a
| more popular one in the years to come. But if you can't find
| anyone who does it, perhaps there's an opportunity for you to
| jump into!
|
| I expect this sort of thing to take the form of people who
| buy "broken, parts only" equipment on eBay/Craigslist/etc and
| fix it at their own location, on their own time, and then
| resell it, though. It's less likely to be a customer facing
| activity.
| userbinator wrote:
| Look for mobile phone repair shops.
| dehrmann wrote:
| > Also for chromebooks and crapbook worth $200-$300, how is
| that rare person going to charge for his time?
|
| I think you stumbled across the problem: troubleshooting and
| repairing the device will probably cost $200. If the device
| is under warranty, it's easier to send it back. If it's not,
| it's more cost effective to replace it.
| varispeed wrote:
| It's not like you have to pay yourself $200 for repairing /
| upgrading your device. But this is quite rewarding and
| worth spending time on just for the feeling that you fixed
| something. Certainly I would prefer this than spending an
| hour watching Netflix.
| imtringued wrote:
| As others have said it would be more productive to just support
| standard PC mainboard standards like DDR3 over SO-DIMM.
| zerohp wrote:
| Part of my job involves working with engineering sample SoCs on
| development and characterization boards.
|
| I've seen just about every kind of socket and connector you can
| imagine but I've never seen a BGA socket that is reliable enough
| to use in a normal machine.
|
| They would never pass qualification use in a typical laptop.
| metadat wrote:
| The GDPR popup on this site is pure dark pattern, try saying "no
| do not sell my data" and the next prompt auto-selects "yes sell
| my data" with a default button of "Allow".
|
| What Fucking Trash.
|
| For anyone who desires reading TFA without the crap salad sando:
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20220421034027/https://www.cnx-s...
|
| https://archive.ph/180ug
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| That's not an interposer; an interposer is a device that sits
| between a device and a board and breaks out the interface so that
| it can be probed with a logic analyzer or timing measurement
| equipment or something.
|
| This looks more like a test fixture socket - those things cost
| more than the entire SBC does - so this seems more like a proof-
| of-concept rather than anything practical right now.
| wildzzz wrote:
| An interposer doesn't have to have any breakout pads or pins.
| It just needs to sit between a board and component. It can
| serve as a breakout for components that may or may not be
| compatible with the footprint on the board or may not break
| anything out at all. I've used one to substitute a much cheaper
| FPGA in for our very expensive one on the development
| prototype. We didn't need all the features while sitting on a
| test bench so we saved ourselves some money until a production
| unit could be our dev platform. We had a few breakouts on the
| board of some signals that were difficult to access elsewhere
| but most just routed right through the interposer. We also
| developed another interposer that replaced a bunch of deadbug
| components to prevent rework from occuring due to poorly placed
| deadbugs. There was enough money to get a little card made but
| not enough to respin the whole board with the wishlist of other
| changes we wanted to make.
| eternityforest wrote:
| Wow, that's awesome. This kind of thing could possibly make
| Chromebooks and the like repairable.
| Syonyk wrote:
| What prevents you from repairing them now, exactly? Hot air
| rework stations have come down dramatically in cost, and
| there's no shortage of videos talking about how to do it. Try a
| few scrap bits before working on something expensive...
|
| It's nice to be able to swap things out with sockets, and
| you'll generally find me coming down on the side of
| repairability, but it exists with a variety of other
| considerations, and something that is less repairable, but also
| far less likely to fail in the first place, may be a better
| option. Also, I rather like the fact that soldered on RAM makes
| things like coldboot attacks a lot harder to pull off if you're
| using trusted boot.
|
| Heavy use of adhesives is certainly a problem, but I just can't
| get that worked up over soldered on RAM.
| Ekaros wrote:
| When I think about it it could certainly make layman
| repairing them cheaper. But I'm not sure if it really would
| chance too much with professional work, the parts and labour
| time would still be about the same or in same magnitude.
|
| And how often does RAM fail anyway? Or if it needs to be
| upgraded what about other parts?
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| I don't have a garage to keep equipment that I will use once
| in 3 years, I don't have scraps to resolder and that's
| probably true for most people. For whatever reason a real
| repairshop is a lot harder to find than a laundrette - I was
| looking for one to fix a GPU, and I could not find one.
| colejohnson66 wrote:
| These sockets cost $60 _a piece_.[0] Four of them alone is
| already ~$250. Add manufacturer markup, and you're looking
| at an extra $300 to the consumer.
|
| If manufacturers want to make RAM replaceable, they should
| be putting SO-DIMM slots (which cost single digits),[1] not
| BGA sockets. After all, the average consumer is more likely
| to know how to procure RAM sticks than raw BGA RAM from
| DigiKey, Mouser, etc.
|
| [0]: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001841972537.html
|
| [1]: https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/10033854-05
| 2FSLF/...
| userbinator wrote:
| This is... not really news? Yes, BGA sockets exist. Device
| programmers and development/evaluation boards often have them.
| Unfortunately they are not cheap, even direct-from-China:
|
| https://siredatech.en.made-in-china.com/product/oSUJIjpOfwYD...
| kurthr wrote:
| I guess maybe they could be made at more reasonable pricing in
| volume?
|
| But you're right. I've needed to have small 100 BGA sockets
| before and typical pricing of non-standard parts was $2k for 4
| with a $1k setup fee.
| [deleted]
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